People-focused knowledge management

Provide superior customer value — Jones’s management empha-
sizes the need to provide the best matches to the individual cus-
tomer’s needs and requirements, thereby providing the highest
possible value to customers.
Understand customers — Jones’s employees recognize that it is
absolutely necessary to understand their customers’ business
purpose, direction, objectives, and their marketplace and that
Jones’s products and services contribute to the customers’ value
creation and how to help customers succeed.
Understand technology opportunities — Jones’s employees
work to understand how and why customers, and the customers’
customers, benefit and are affected by different technology 
solutions.
Collaborate with customers to maximize value of assistance —
Jones’s teams collaborate with customers to conceptualize 
and engineer new products. The teams consist of a mix of
researchers, design engineers, and crafts people to allow imme-
diate incorporation of insights into advanced solutions and 
practical assessments of how solutions can be built in the
factory.
Develop relationships — Jones’s management emphasizes the
need for employees to network and develop good relationships
with customers, suppliers, and coworkers. They rely on these
relationships to understand what is needed and what they can
provide. Internal relationships are crucial for frictionless and
effective operations and for support of workforce morale.
Understand the universe of product opportunities — Jones’s
management and employees — professionals and crafts people
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— are continually provided with opportunities such as partici-
pating in professional meetings to understand the importance 
of utilizing and benefiting from advanced technologies and
materials.
Ascertain that the company has command of state-of-the-art
technology — Jones invests in advanced technology expertise
early — through benchmarking or acquisition of licenses and
equipment — and experiments with promising technology in the
factory for trials and familiarization before they are needed for
customer work.
Prepare employees to implement corporate strategy — Through
companywide information, education, discussion, and feedback
programs, Jones’s employees build understanding of corporate
thrusts, direction, and strategy and of how they as individuals
can assist in implementing the company’s goals. Employees also
understand how their future depends on their own performance
and the company’s long-term and durable success.
Innovate faster than competitors — Jones’s management
believes that to keep their leadership position they need to 
learn quickly and innovate faster than their competitors — in 
technology, in management and operational practices, and in
strategy.
Support personal learning — By understanding why it is to 
their personal benefit, Jones’s employees take it upon themselves
to learn about advances in every field they think will be 
important for their work. They are recognized and rewarded 
as a group for practical curiosity, innovations, and their 
ability to collaborate and share insights. Jones’s culture fosters
agility, versatility, and flexibility in a noncompetitive, safe 
environment.
Foster knowledge-focused mentality and culture — Jones’s
senior management believes that each employee must under-
stand, as second nature, how better knowledge is built and 
leveraged — through personal and company investments,
through collaboration, and through deeply entrenched and prac-
ticed tradeoffs between short-term facilitation and long-term
strength.
As a result of pursuing such practices, Jones Development & 
Engineering, Inc. has been able to maintain its global leadership 
position. In addition, it has become a role model for other proactive
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organizations that also work to become leaders in their market
niches.
The Global Economy Challenge
Many factors drive the global economy and make the world a chal-
lenging business environment with complex implications for most
courses of actions. That makes it difficult for some enterprises 
to provide products and services with sufficient margins to stay in
business. For others, it makes a much larger marketplace with near
endless opportunities. Positive aspects of globalization provide new
opportunities for enterprises and individuals throughout the world,
including developing nation states. For the first time, many people
are able to contribute and improve their quality of life regardless 
of their geographical location. Such changes are particularly notice-
able for people who deliver knowledge-intensive products and ser-
vices to customers in other parts of the world. Numerous examples
can be cited where new international industries have emerged in geo-
graphical areas that earlier were quite isolated. Services ranging from 
software development to call centers are provided from locations 
that previously were isolated in Asia, Latin America, and Africa. In
addition, sophisticated design and manufacturing that traditionally
were performed only in industrialized nations have migrated into
countries that earlier did not have the capabilities to deliver such
products.
Globalization causes work itself to become more complex. Work
must satisfy requirements for improved effectiveness and provide
deliverables with new features and increased capabilities that provide
the needed competitive value in the global marketplace. In response,
competitive enterprises prepare their workforces better, automate or
outsource many routine functions, and organize work in ways that
produce new deliverables. In many situations, work becomes more
sophisticated and expands to take advantage of new capabilities
brought about by the increased availability of personal and structural
knowledge. Efficiency is improved by automation systems that
perform routine tasks, thus freeing people to apply greater expertise
to more demanding and value-creating work. Application of
advanced technology and development by sophisticated organiza-
tions continue the refinement of work in general.
Figure 1-1 presents an example of the globalization complexity.
Nine independent factors indicate the diversity of influences that
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affect global economy opportunities and pressures. In the context of
this book, it is important to understand that every one of these factors
is influenced by the effective actions of people at every organizational
level — by their competence, their expertise, and their knowledge. To
a lesser, but very important, extent, technology, especially informa-
tion technology (IT), also influences how these factors will change
performance in the global economy.
Globalization causes work to change and become more complex,
satisfying requirements for improved effectiveness and providing
deliverables with new features and increased capabilities. To
compete, enterprises strive to increase performance productivity on
both micro and nano levels. They prepare their workforces better,
automate many routine functions, and organize work in ways that
create better deliverables. Automation systems perform routine tasks,
thus freeing people to perform more demanding work, which
inevitably enables them to add more features and options and to
Competing in the Global Economy Requires Effective Enterprises
5