I don’t particularly care for the “right info to the right person at the right time” description of KM, for many reasons but mainly because most people who use it state this as the purpose of knowledge management, coming from a perspective of information management to support known or existing processes. In other words, not KM at all but rather IM (information management). In the past, I’ve all but dismissed this description of KM, but I’ve started thinking of it in a more positive light lately.
KM, to me, is a process whose purpose is to develop mastery. And what is mastery, after all, if not the ability to call on past knowledge (information?) and synthesize it into something new that you can use at the moment you need it? The right info/person/time is just one aspect – an important aspect, maybe – of KM, but a means to the end and not the end in itself.
Will have to give this some more thought.
no straight lines 