A New Special Interest Group - Enabling Technologies

Why a new SIG?
At KIN, we constantly strive to ensure that we are meeting the needs of our members. Over the last year, we have solicited input in various forms, mostly from KIN quarterly workshops. We have consolidated the inputs we have received (along with a few ideas of our own) and by the time you read this KIN members will have completed a survey that we initiated to more accurately gauge the level of interest in a range of topics so that we can ensure that the programme of events for 2009 truly meets the needs of our members.

We are using the results of this to prioritise which events to organise during the course of the year and to organise SIGs to meet member demand as far as we are able.


We tagged all of the inputs we reviewed prior to the survey being undertaken and generated the above 'tag cloud' based on the number of times a topic or theme was mentioned as an area of interest to KIN members. It was apparent that there was a lot of interest in what we loosely termed 'Collaboration Technologies'. So, we believe that there is sufficient demand for a new SIG based around 'Enabling Technologies'. We decided on 'Enabling Technologies' rather than 'Collaboration Technologies' so that we could encompass a wider range of tools than just those implied by the term 'Collaboration Technologies'.

What will be included in the 'Enabling Technologies' SIG.

When we undertook our review of the member inputs, we grouped the topics under the three themes. People, Process and Technology. The topics that were listed under the Technology theme were:

Seeking and finding	People and expertise search, Enterprise search strategy, Enterprise search tool selection, Metadata, RSS
Platforms and Intranets	Team/Community Workspaces, Collaboration technologies, SharePoint, Knowledge platforms, Portal/Intranet strategy, Discussion forums / boards
Wikis	WIKIs for Lessons Learned, Implementing Wikis, Practical Usage of Wikis, Encouraging participation, How do Wikis help
Web 2.0 and Social Media	Practical usage of Blogs,Social bookmarking,Social networking & media. Openness vs security of social media,Social networks vs heirarchy,Participative media
Knowledge capture tools - IT	Technology for capturing lessons learned ,Knowledge elicitation tools,Decision mapping tools
Information Management	Information and records management (not paper), Document management (including paper records), Content management

What will this SIG do and how can I participate?

This SIG will address many of the topics in the Technology theme. Clearly, none of the Technology things are 'just about the Technology' but have People and Process aspects also. My current intention with the ET SIG is to address the People and Process aspects which are 'driven' by the usage of specific enabling technologies. (This will, of course, be validated by canvassing the views of any and all KIN members who would like to participate in the ET SIG.)

So we won't be just talking about the technologies themselves, but looking at the pragmatic issues around their implementation and effective use. My initial thoughts are that the most useful thing that this SIG could do would be to pool their knowledge and experience and develop a set of guidelines and good practices and example policies for the implementation of Knowledge Sharing Enabling Technologies.

As with all the SIGs, there will be a range of Roundtables, Masterclasses, Webinars and Peer Assists organised.

So if you want to be part of this exciting new SIG (and you are a KIN member, of course) drop me a line I will ensure you are kept informed of future events.