Note to the Editor:
Please publish this article in conjunction with Al Kaniss' commentary titled "The 'Vulcan Mind Meld': We're not quite there yet."

By NAVAIR Executive Secretariat

One of the major challenges facing NAVAIR today is the loss of profound knowledge due to the retirement of an aging workforce. The Command needs mechanisms for transferring knowledge from person to person in order to reduce this loss and retain corporate intellectual capital. By identifying and documenting knowledge critical to NAVAIR’s mission, the Command will be more enabled to effectively support the Warfighter. Since employees are overloaded with information, the organization needs optimized processes with supporting tools for converting information to useful knowledge in an environment where downsizing and funding reductions are the norm.

Knowledge Management (KM) is NAVAIR’s disciplined approach to identify, acquire, sustain, share, and use critical knowledge in order to more effectively support the Warfighter. When properly deployed and applied, it results in wisdom that leads to better decisions and outcomes.

“KM is the modern marriage between the lore and sage wisdom of old and the powerful media of today and the future,” said Stu Young, Knowledge Management Enterprise Team (KMET) leader and NAVAIR Director of Systems Engineering. “Our challenge is to harness the best of both and exploit the incredible tools we have in an environment of trust and shared commitment to excellence. In the past we told stories, spent years with apprentices at our sides, and often gained knowledge through trial and error. Today we are overflowing with information in myriad forms, but the sheer volume makes finding the gems difficult. A successful approach to KM will make us powerful and will make our warfighters unbeatable.”

The KMET is an aligning mechanism directed with developing a NAVAIR KM strategy and assisting with its implementation. Currently, NAVAIR Leadership, along with the KMET, is seeking ways to increase and improve knowledge sharing among all its employees to help formalize the management of “organizational” know-how and to increase overall efficiency in supporting the Warfighter. The KMET is spreading the word about the initiative to raise awareness, to provide networking resources for sharing KM information and best practices and to help align KM efforts across the Command.

E-mail, newsletters, communities of practice, trip reports, staff meetings, hallway conversations, and even stories shared in the carpool are all methods of sharing knowledge. Ideally, the KM program will create a means for anyone in the command to easily archive, share and retrieve knowledge, thereby enabling more efficient support to the warfighter. When “best practice” solutions are readily available, the need to “reinvent the wheel” is eliminated and the amount of time needed to track down information is minimized.

“Many people in our command are frustrated as they see mistakes repeated and lessons not learned,” said Young. “We see best practices cultivated on one program that fail to find their way into other programs. If we are to learn from the past and master our future, we need people with passion who want to make us the best we can be. We owe it to ourselves, the Warfighters, and our country to get this right.”

For information, questions or to participate in or comment on the NAVAIR knowledge management initiative, contact the KMET at [email protected].