Can KM Be Fun? – Part 1 of 2
A few days ago I asked the question to some KM colleagues, “What if KM were *really* fun for people to do and not a drudge, as it seems to be for workers in many KM programs?” My thought was that many of the tasks people have to perform in the name of knowledge management activities are monotonous or tedious, like filling in forms, or tagging documents, or forwarding items to a repository, or creating a profile to describe their expertise. I started thinking, could we do things that are low cost, impromptu and fun to reinforce the good/desired behaviors and lighten up the work environment just a bit? Some different views emerged from the discussion, resulting in a few discrepancies that I want to clarify before I get to the fun part.
Fun (not Funny) vs. Play vs. Enjoyment
It was interesting how different people understood different meanings from my use of the word “fun”. Now I will clarify, using Oxford’s Online Dictionary as my source for these definitions.
Fun = “lighthearted pleasure or amusement” or “playfulness or good humour”. Note that fun doesn’t have to be funny, as in making jokes. Fun to me is simply a small moment of playful amusement–in the case of KM, to lighten up an otherwise boring, but necessary task. Play = “games or activities engaged in for enjoyment,” or to engage in games or other activities for enjoyment. Enjoy = “take pleasure in or have a pleasant time.” So enjoyment is what results from taking pleasure in or having a pleasant time.
One usually experiences enjoyment from either “fun” or “play”, and one can experience fun from “play”, but to me “fun” is a label applied to any enjoyable, usually brief, experience that may or may not be repeated, and may or may not be productive.
I also want to make another distinction. Where I mention giving a toy or fun object as part of the program, it’s not that the objects themselves are the “fun”…it’s the way they are delivered or the unexpected nature of anyone even noticing that makes it fun (and enjoyable). We’ve all read about those crazy pranks that show up on YouTube or in The Office…like putting tape over the mouthpiece of someone’s phone so they can’t be heard, or wrapping someone’s cubicle all in aluminum foil or draping it tissue paper. There is a fun/surprise element to those, though they are mostly annoying in the end. But the pranks, while memorable, don’t reinforce a behavior, and that is the purpose of the fun I’m suggesting.
The Value of the Word Serious
Working for big corporations and governments has done a lot to dampen our ability or willingness to have fun in the workplace. Our managers make serious decisions about serious matters that have a serious impact on the organization’s future and people’s lives and well being. It’s no wonder, then, that most managers are afraid to break out of the serious mold, lest someone should think they don’t realize the significance of the serious business they are about and penalize them. That’s why corporations, and especially training groups, have adopted the term “serious games” from the gaming world. “Game” lets one know there should be something enjoyable about the activity, but “serious games” makes it okay to talk about at work, because the game is not just fun and a waste of time and money if it’s “serious”. It’s purposeful. (Trainers, IT and management consultants totally understand this mindset, and use it to sell new ideas.) To label an activity as “serious” lets a manager think, “If it is serious, it has value, can be measured, and will result in desirable outcomes. If it happens to be fun…well, okay…we just won’t promote that aspect of it, because our executives might disapprove.” Fun has become a stealth activity in many organizations.
While prevalent today, this belief or assumption doesn’t apply to all workers or managers, of course. It’s true that there are many people who are motivated by the acceptable and politically-correct carrot of working hard and being fiscally responsible. But there are a large group of others who are not motivated by achievement, and who have different values. For these, fun is a powerful motivator.
Recent research by William Hart and Dolores Albarracín supports this notion. They found that people motivated by achievement respond well to competition and encouragement to excel. For another large group of people, however, these can be a demotivator, because they have different goals. They don’t value excellence as much as they value their own well-being or want to enjoy themselves. We are seeing many people with these motivators arising in the so-called Gen Y and Millenials groups. It seems to me that our existing organizational structures already provide plenty of motivation for the achievement and competition oriented types. Putting a little fun into KM could be a very powerful way to bring the others in the organization on board.
Overcoming the Roadblocks to Fun KM
KM practitioners at all levels face the same roadblocks if they want to incorporate fun into their programs. If they make an appeal on the basis of value to the organization or quantifying intellectual capital, they will hit employees (or “knowledge workers”) who are already on board with such values. Yet they may be missing other employees who could be motivated to participate in activities for different reasons. These people may value and consider it necessary to have fun and breaks in the routine at work. That’s why they attend the monthly birthday cake gathering for people they barely know, or pre-order Thanksgiving Day pies from John from the mailroom who is dressed up like a turkey, or string blinking lights and decorations around their cubicle for Christmas.
That is why I think that injecting incidents of fun into a routine KM program could be a good way to reinforce positive KM behaviors, and help to improve stiff or secretive environments. Where it’s culturally possible, of course. One person in the discussion group noted that in traditional European cultures, like Switzerland’s, it would simply be viewed as inappropriate and might create a backlash for the KM practitioner. That may be so, yet it doesn’t invalidate the assumption that there are workers who are not movitated by appeals to excellence or achievement, and who might be motivated by “fun.” In Part 2 of this article, I will provide some examples of activities that would be appropriate “fun” in a business context. Some may even work in Switzerland!
How to Measure Changes
In a perfect business world, all activities could be measured and valued and included on the balance sheet. That is to say, in a perfect business world based upon current accounting standards that grossly fail to assign value to intangibles, such as customer good will, employee satisfaction, brand name, intellectual capital, and social network relationships. I discussed this previously here. Here are some discussions of the issues behind valuing intangibles, such as the Financial Accounting Standards Board’s SFAS 141 and 142, and the factors that drive intangibles.
Attorney and specialist on work place issues Mary Rau-Foster says, “Can the benefits to having fun be measured? Yes, by comparing the absenteeism, tardiness, and turnover rates pre-program implementation. In addition, an employee satisfaction survey can reveal how employees feel about their jobs, the company, and company culture. Will your customer complaints decrease as they encounter happier employees.” She also notes that a worker’s inability to laugh on the job may be a sign of impending burn-out.
Dr. David Abramis, a behavioral scientist at Cal State Long Beach studies fun at work. He has shown that people who have fun on the job are more creative, more productive, better decision-makers, and get along better with co-workers. They also have fewer absentee, late, and sick days than people who aren’t having fun.
Despite the fuzzy nature of their work, KM practitioners work tirelessly to find ways to prove the value of KM to the organization. It’s a little like good art — hard to define, but we know it when we see it. The purpose of my comments here is not to define ways to measure improvement. Yet, one way that comes to mind is to identify all those KM participants who contribute little or nothing to the effort, then try a couple of fun activities with that group, and note any changes in their levels of participation. It’s important to get the KM program firing on all cylinders. A Baldridge Foundation survey of Fortune 500 CEOs identified knowledge management as the second most important need behind globalization. The more techniques (fun or otherwise) that we can apply to getting people to participate, the better our outcomes will be, the better morale will be, and the more the organization will benefit.
Please go to Part 2 of this topic to see some premises to consider for fun activities, and examples of activities that might work for you.
