A workshop that combines cooking and storytelling to exemplify aspects of knowledge management is a bit unusual for a conference, but Kim Glover pulled it off today during the new KM and AI Summit conference.
Glover began the webinar by asking people to tell a story about the memory of a childhood dish. She then told her own story about gumbo. Gumbo is serious business in the South, she said, but everyone cooks it differently, so that no two are exactly alike. Teaching her son to make gumbo relied on several KM principles. It's a hands-on, tactile process. Be explicit, put the tools in his hands, and share tacit knowledge( such as chop it a little finer or the roux needs to be darker so keep stirring). User verbal signposting and storytelling.
Her other story was about a 5-minute thrown down appetizer involving apples, cream cheese, jalapenos, almonds, and muscadine jelly which she made based on her knowledge of what flavors and textures go together. Documenting the formula, the thought processes behind made-up dishes, correlates with capturing tacit knowledge in the workplace. At a dinner party, she described her formula, without realizing how much attention the children at the party were listening. They proceeded to make their own version with apples, peanut butter, walnuts, and honey. A wonderful example of knowledge transfer! The lesson learned: Make the tacit as explicit as you can, capturing it for reuse by others.
Cooking together, which Glover does occasionally with her staff, leads to brainstormling and discussion. It's essentially a KM community of practice and another learning opportunity. Lurking is learning, she said. Here's another approach likening cooking to KM. Think about what is in your refrigerator or your pantry and you'll realize it's a random group of products. Wondering what to do with them reinforced the KM notion that having access to knowledge is not the same as knowing
The KM & AI Summit, held March 17-19 in Scottsdale, Arizona, heralds a new era of KM.
The KMWorld conference returns to the J.W. Marriott in Washington D.C. on November 17-20, 2025 https://www.kmworld.com/Conference/2025
KMWorld 2025 is a part of a unique program of five co-located conferences, which also includes Enterprise Search & Discovery, Enterprise AI World, Taxonomy Boot Camp, and Text Analytics Forum.