Knowledge that stays

There is a decisive difference between what a person knows and what the organisation knows. As long as knowledge lives only in heads, it leaves the building as soon as a head leaves. For an organisation that is not bad luck but an avoidable risk, and reducing it is part of the leadership task.

Chapter 6 shows what happens when knowledge depends only on people.

Here a fine but important distinction is worthwhile, one that is often blurred. The clarification itself, that is working out the fundamentals, preparing information and developing proposals, can and should be delegated. Nobody expects leadership to gather every basis with their own hands. What cannot be delegated are the decisions that depend on leadership responsibility.

The preparation may pass through many hands; the decision stays with leadership. Drawing this line cleanly relieves and protects at the same time.

Above all, the information and documents needed for project leadership and project steering must be recorded: approach, roles, decision logic and insights gained. This leadership and steering information makes projects traceable and manageable for the organisation.

Subject-matter project results are something else. They can continue to be kept in the systems, repositories and tools intended for them. This requires neither a central repository for all project information nor a comprehensive knowledge management solution for the entire company.

How far an organisation has already come with this, from person-dependent to self-learning handling of knowledge, is shown by the maturity level in Chapter 7. What has been recorded needs a framework that applies to all projects. That is the subject of the next chapter.