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Knowledge Mobilization Blog

The Knowledge Mobilization Works blog is the place to find out about the latest developments on existing projects as well as to discover new and emerging projects. You can subscribe to this blog, search the contents, and leave personal comments.

Building the Knowledge Mobilization CommunityJanuary 2

This year is going to be a busy one for Knowledge Mobilization Works. As we enter into our third year of business, we are focusing on the theme of: Building the Knowledge Mobilization Community.

As such we are organizing our activities into several areas. We will still deliver consulting services on knowledge mobilization and provide perspective and expertise as speakers at events organized by others.

However, much of our activity this year will be on bringing people together through events and publications. We wish to share our collective intelligence and build a community of practitioners and researchers across Canada, the USA, and other jurisdictions internationally.

Here is a preview of what we have planned:

Ongoing projects include:

Knowledge Mobilization Boot Camps
Exploring select KMb topics through active participation and a focus on action and capacity building

Manifestation: Journal of community-engaged research and learning partnerships
www.manifestationjournal.org

Mind Your Words

Silos, Politics and Turf WarsDecember 24 2008

Let me start by wishing everyone Happy Holidays. I hope that 2009 brings you everything you need - perhaps a little of what you want.

Last night I took a few hours to read “Silos. politics and Turf Wars” by Patrick Lencioni

The subtitle is “A Leadership Fable about destroying the barriers that turn colleagues into competitors.”

The book is light but useful. I am reminded of the work of Steve Denning and storytelling. For thousands of years we have taught each other important lessons through storytelling. This book fits nicely into that tradition. It is not a difficult, heavy, academic tone - rather, it tells the story of a reasonably believable character who helps companies overcome their silo issues.

The heart of the story gets to a Model - on page 178, comprised of a thematic goal, a set of defining objectives, a set of ongoing standard operating objectives, and metrics. Pretty basic stuff however, the gift that the author gives us is the way it is told.

If you need a new way to deal with

Ken Robinson: Out of our MIndsDecember 22 2008

In November of this year I had the privilege to work with Sir Ken Robinson at the Summit of the Council of Ontario Directors of Education (CODE). During lunch he said to me: “I had a chance to visit your website. You are doing some very interesting things. Let’s stay in touch.” To which I replied: “Thank you. I think your work is fabulous and it would be my pleasure to work with you.” And then we traded cards and chatted some more. So, since I had not yet read his books I decided that would be a good place to start.

I just finished “Out Of Our Minds: Learning to be Creative” and I must say that it is a must read. So to whet your appetite, here are 10 points that I thought very useful, interesting, compelling, and some are funny.

page 3, Everyone has creative abilities, but they often do not know what they are.
page 4, We are caught up in a social and economic revolution.
page 37, The interaction of genetics, neur

Human Resources for Knowledge MobilizationDecember 22 2008

The 2nd Mobilizer Boot Camp: Workshop on Human Resources for Knowledge Mobilization is now available for registration. In this workshop up to 50 participants will focus on the crucial problem of "who does the work of knowledge mobilization?" Collectively, we will examine the characteristics of effective knowledge brokers/mobilizers, how to manage people who are involved in knowledge mobilization, and what is needed for knowledge mobilization professional development.

The workshop is on Friday, February 20, 2009, 8:00 am - 4:00 pm (Eastern Time) at the Hilton Toronto Airport, 5875 Airport Road, Mississauga
www.regonline.ca/63364_683901D

There are also a few spaces still open for the 1st Mobilizer Boot Camp: Workshop on Incentives and Infrastructure for Knowledge Mobilization in Ottawa on January 23, 2009.
www.regonline.ca/63361_674577N
--
Peter Norman Levesque
Director, Knowledge Mobilization Works
http://www.knowledgemob

Embedded CalendarDecember 21 2008

The good people at Google continue to produce very useful tools. I moved my personal and professional calendars to Google Calendar earlier this year. They have an easy to use function that allows you to embed a html snippet on a web page so that you can share calendar events. KMbW now has a small calendar on the Mobilize page, another on the Bootcamps page, and a large more detailed on on the Events page - and they are all automatically updated when I update calendar.

Cool.