A coworker posed a question today on one of our internal discussion areas looking for thoughts on the differences between knowledge management (KM), Lean Six Sigma (LSS), and Continuous Process Improvement (CPI). I know a little about KM, not so much about LSS and CPI, but took a stab at a response anyway. Here’s what I came up with:

• KM is about things you don’t yet know how to do or that you have never done
• LSS is about doing better that which you already know how to do in the way you already know how to do them
• CPI is about finding better ways to do what you already know how to do

Each has its place, depending on what you are trying to accomplish, it’s not an all or nothing proposition. Just as organizations need a good mix of structure and fluidity, they need a mix of sustaining and improving on the things that are necessary and learning new things. And, yes, I’d say that there is some correlation between these, where the infrastructure will typically benefit from increased efficiency (LSS, CPI) and operations needs the ability to learn and grow (KM).

Unfortunately, “all or nothing” seems to be the default approach of many as they try to improve an organization. But just as the means of keeping the human body healthy is different and distinct from learning a new language, the processes and tools we implement to keep our organizational infrastructure healthy differ drastically from the way we interact with our operational environment.

A better analogy may be the training of an athlete. The athlete trains both body and mind together towards a single goal, building up from perfecting the basics (LSS), learning how to combine the basics into effective combinations (CPI), and ultimately pulling on this past training and effective interpretation of the environment in which they are performing to achieve something they had not done before (KM).

How would you describe the differences between KM, LSS, and CPI?