Most definitions of knowledge are not very useful when it actually comes time for people to do something with knowledge, such as its accumulation, sharing, processing, or management. It turns out that the act of well-defining knowledge itself is difficult. So the second pillar of knowledge management is to have a useful working definition of knowledge.

A well-constructed technical definition accurately reflects different layers of understanding. (Contrasted to the hackneyed jargon often intended to obscure understanding.)

So as far as background assumptions about what people know and how they know it, here’s what I’ve been thinking (with others) for a few years:

• There are subjects that can be personally explicitly defined, or merely implicitly understood by a person;
• These subjects can be given one or more names;
• These subjects exist or occur within situations (or contexts);
• These contexts may or may not affect the meaning of a particular subject;
• These contexts can be personally explicitly defined, or merely implicitly understood;
• These contexts can be named or not;
• Any subject may become related to any other subject in ways that may or may not be known in advance;
• Any contexts may become related to any other contexts in ways that may or may not be known in advance;
• Any relationship may be personally explicitly defined, or merely implicitly understood by a person;
• These relationships can be named or not;
• Any artifact that comprises subjects, contexts, or relationships is most commonly expressed in ordinary words, phrases, or symbols that have meaning to a person. That is, they are at the content level of expressiveness more often than they are data objects.

My Working Definition of Knowledge

A collection of content, contexts, and relationships that expresses topical meaning with sufficient fidelity to meet the consumption needs of a user and/or the processing needs of an agent.

Come back soon, for more …

Category: General