Bill Kaplan: Profiles in Knowledge

Originally published July 12, 2023

This is the 93rd article in the Profiles in Knowledge series featuring thought leaders in knowledge management. Bill Kaplan is an independent knowledge management practitioner, consultant, coach, advisor, trainer, author, and speaker based in Camas, Washington. His approach to KM is business-focused, non-academic, and practice-based, evolved from 20 years of KM solution planning and delivery. He focuses on “Creating Value from Knowledge” throughout the workplace as part of the way the work gets done. This includes dealing with knowledge capture, sharing, and retention challenges by mitigating and preventing knowledge loss due to workforce turnover.

I have known Bill for many years and often see him at the KMWorld Conference. He has been an active member of the SIKM Leaders Community since 2009, frequently replying to queries. We recently worked together as part of the Midwest KM Symposium planning committee, both presenting at the 2023 event held at Kent State University.

Background

Bill is the Founder of Working KnowledgeCSP, an independent, internationally recognized knowledge management consulting company. CSP stands for Concept | Strategy | Practice. After a 25-year USAF career, Bill served as the Chief Knowledge Officer and Knowledge Management Practice Manager at Acquisition Solutions, Inc. (ASI), a public sector focused management consulting company. Under Bill’s knowledge leadership, ASI earned Top 20 North American Most Admired Knowledge Enterprise (MAKE) recognition from Teleos in 2007, 2008, and 2009. Prior to that, he was the Deputy Global KM Practice Manager at SAIC. CIO Review recognized Working KnowledgeCSP as one of the “10 Most Promising KM Solution Providers of 2018 and 2020.”

Bill holds a BS in Business and Economics from Lehigh University, an MBA from Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville, and a Professional Degree in Engineering Management with a concentration in Knowledge Management from The George Washington University. He previously taught KM as an adjunct professor in knowledge management at the University of Maryland, Global Campus.

Education

• The George Washington University — Professional Degree, Engineering Management/Knowledge Management, 2006–2010
• Dwight D. Eisenhower School for National Security and Resource Strategy — NSM, National Security Policy and Research Studies, 1992–1993
• Southern Illinois University Edwardsville — MBA, Management, 1979–1980
• Lehigh University — BS, Business and Economics, 1969–1973

Experience

• Working KnowledgeCSP LLC — Founder and Principal Consultant, 2009 — present
• University of Maryland Global Campus — Adjunct Professor (Knowledge Management), 2018–2021
• ASI (Acquisition Solutions, Inc.) — Chief Knowledge Officer and KM Practice Manager, 2005–2009
• SAIC (Science Application International Corporation) — Deputy KM Practice Manager, Senior Consultant-Knowledge Management and Senior Consultant-Government Acquisition Policy and Process, 1998–2005
• United States Air Force, 1973–1998

Profiles

• About
• Highlights
• LinkedIn
• Lucidea’s Lens

Content

• Blog
• LinkedIn Posts
• RealKM
• Twitter

Articles

1. Knowledge Management: Leveraging the “Electrome” or “Learning at the Speed of Knowing”
2. US Climate Change Mitigation Strategy Requires System Thinking and Defined Requirements
3. Knowledge Management and Critical Thinking: Congress, Legislative Outcomes and Systems Thinking
4. Knowledge Management: Lessons Learned and Design Thinking — Crafting an Environmentally and Economically Balanced “Fit for Purpose” National Energy Policy
5. Knowledge Management: “… each man is my superior, each woman also my superior, in that I may learn from him and her”
6. The Incoming Administration: Transition, Decision Making, and the Value of Knowledge Management
7. People, not Technology, Are Always the Foundation for KM Success
8. Communities of Practice (CoP) in International Financial Institutions
9. KM and Evidenced Based Collaboration: a Solution for the Partial US Gov’t Shutdown
10. KM ISO Standard: Progress Towards Accredited KM Certification ??
11. 3 Assumptions That Might Be Sabotaging Your KM Efforts
12. The Challenges In Building a KM Program in the Federal Government
13. Knowledge Management (KM) and US Talks with North Korea (NOKO)
14. CoP Success and the Concept of Shared Value
15. No Time for KM in Times of Change?
16. Context Puts a Face on Knowledge and Lets You See Inside
17. 5 Reasons You Can’t Get the Go Ahead for Your KM Effort!
18. The Long Term Value of Current Content and Knowledge Sharing: Your Relevance
19. Agile Knowledge Management: How to Rapidly Develop a Sustainable Knowledge Transfer Capability While Increasing Performance
20. Practice-Based KM Maturity Model

Community of Practice (CoP) Maturity Model

Value Creation from Knowledge

Knowledge at the Point of Execution®

KM Framework

Knowledge Enabled Organizations

LinkedIn Articles

1. Knowledge Management: Requirements Definition, Consensus and Lessons Learned in Delivering The Equality Act (2021)
2. Knowledge Management: “Performing and Learning”: Lessons from 2020 for a National Voting Standard
3. What Does Good Policing Look Like and How Does a Community Define It? The Value of User Stories and Use Cases
4. Knowledge Management and the Plans to Return to Campus: Learning to Create Value from Other People’s Knowledge
5. Learning Not Blame: “Inquiry” Not “Inquisition”
6. Operating “Faster Than the Speed of Change”: Creating Value from State Knowledge in the Fight Against COVID-19
7. NY Governor Andrew Cuomo: “Creating Value from Knowledge”
8. The Evolving Knowledge Management (KM) ISO Standard Is Your Friend, But You Need to Place the Standard in Context!
9. Communities of Practice: Reflections of KM Versatility
10. Agile Knowledge Management
11. Program Management: Improving Knowledge Capability to Mitigate Operational Risk in Program Execution
12. The Knowledge Manager: Key to Creating Value From Your Knowledge
13. Knowledge Leadership, the News Media, Trust, and Enabling Learning Lessons in Baltimore
14. Creating Value from Knowledge: The Chief Knowledge Officer
15. Knowledge Management vs. Knowledge Leadership
16. Measuring the Unmeasurable: Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3
17. Practically Speaking, Does Professional Certification in Knowledge Management Exist? Part 1…Yet? and Part 2: How Will You Know It’s Real?

Concept and Practice

The Knowledge Edge Series

1. Understanding KM
2. KM Concept, Strategy, and Practice
3. Knowledge Leadership
4. KM Concepts: Fundamentals of a Knowledge Enabled Organization
5. One View of Knowledge
6. High Performing Knowledge Enabled Organizations
7. Fast Learning
8. CoPs (Part 1)
9. CoPs (Part 2)
10. Knowledge Assets
11. Knowledge at the Point of Execution
12. Developing Knowledge Workers Through Senior Management Leadership
13. Operationalizing Learning
14. Understanding KM Certification

Articles

1. Replacing Risk with Knowledge to Deliver Better Acquisition Outcomes
2. Knowledge is the Source of Better Acquisition Outcomes
3. Capturing, Retaining, and Leveraging Federal Agency Workforce Knowledge — ATSD
4. Leveraging Our Critical Acquisition Knowledge
5. Deploying a Knowledge Convergence Framework: Four key elements for building a performance learning culture

Creating a Sustainable KM Framework: The Concept | Strategy | Practice | (CSP) Model

CSP Model

Articles by Others

1. Interview: Bill Kaplan on Knowledge Loss and Employee Turnover by Mimi Dionne
2. How Technology Will Affect the Future of Knowledge Management by Lauren Trees
3. Connecting the dot.govs by Steve Barth
4. Alternatives to definition by Dave Snowden
5. 2016 election: an opportunity to reset knowledge management by Meredith Somers
6. CIO Profile

SIKM Leaders Community

• Posts

Bill’s tribute to Melissie Rumizen

I worked closely with Melissie Rumizen while she was with the KM consulting team led by Kent Greenes at the original SAIC. One key learning for me from Melissie was her perspective that there is no “perfect KM Strategy” for an organization. The idea that the strategy should and will develop through practical application and “performing and learning” in the job and on the job is a fundamental that anchors much of my current approach to KM consulting. I still refer to my copy of the book with her inscription to me on a regular basis. I visited with her in her home in Fairfax, VA shortly before she passed away…she gave me some advice and it is in this inscription. Melissie told me KM was not an easy discipline with which to work, and if I was to stay with it, I needed to be always a “source of learning” for my colleagues and my clients. Melissie was and remains, through her thinking and writing, a real practitioner in the field.

Presentations

• 2009–06 Managing Knowledge Loss Due to Workforce Attrition — Slides
• 2014–07 Losing Your Minds: Capturing, Leveraging & Retaining Organizational Knowledge — Slides
• 2016–02 Agile KM — Slides
• 2019–02 The Value of CoPs in International Financial Institutions — Slides

Presentations

• Practice-Based KM Maturity Model
• Community of Practice Maturity Model
• KM Framework
• 7 “Must Know” KM Fundamentals to Implement Knowledge-Based Contract Management
• Strategic and Critical Thinking
• SlideShare

Conferences

KM Showcase

• 2019 — Communities of Practice — Shared Value
• 2020 — Knowledge Management is Easier to Deliver as a Slogan than as a Sustainable Initiative

KMWorld

• 2015 W3: Applying ‘Agile’ in Developing KM Strategies & Implementing Frameworks
• 2010

1. Replacing Risk With Knowledge in Program Operations — Slides
2. Knowledge Loss Strategies — Slides

NASPO

• Managing the Risk of Knowledge Loss Due to Workforce Attrition

DoD and Federal Knowledge Management Symposium

• 2019 The Key to KM and Digital Transformation is Not Technology

SLA

• 2021 Developing, Implementing, and Resetting a KM Strategy in a Time of Uncertainty

KMGN

• KMAgile — KM Strategy Development “Faster than the Speed of Change”

Midwest KM Symposium

• 2023 Knowledge Management Made Simpler, But Not Necessarily Easier! Lessons from KM in Practice

Bill Kaplan presenting at the 2023 Midwest KM Symposium

Performing and Learning

Operationalizing Learning

Context puts a face on knowledge and lets you see inside

Successful Communities of Practice

Podcasts

• KM Journey, KM Philosophy, the ISO Standard, and the Value of a KM Strategy — Santosh Shekar
• Because You Need To Know — Edwin K. Morris
• Knowledge Cast — Zach Wahl
• Knowledge Cast — Making Knowledge Management Clickable — Bill interviews Zach Wahl and Joe Hilger of Enterprise Knowledge

Videos

• Global Knowledge Management Congress & Awards 2016

• Striking a Balance Between KM Theory, Concepts and Practical Application

• Community of Practice Success and the Concept of Shared Value

• Difference between Knowledge Management and Knowledge Leadership

• Characteristics of Knowledge-Enabled High-Performing Organizations

• Agile Knowledge Management

• How Training Can Help Manage Organizational Knowledge

• Resolving the Issue of Workforce Turnover and Knowledge Loss

• Competencies of a Chief Knowledge Officer

• Measuring the Intangible Elements of Knowledge

• Comparing KM in the private sector and in global development

• Strategies for gaining a competitive edge through employee engagement and satisfaction

Books

Losing your minds: Capturing, Retaining and Leveraging Organizational Knowledge

• Table of Contents, Summary, and Foreword
• Review by Mimi Dionne

Gaining buy-in for KM edited by Laura Slater

• Chapter 3: Knowledge accountability drives knowledge management success