Knowledge Management Thought Leader 54: Keeley Sorokti

Originally posted 11-Jan-24

Keeley Sorokti is a strategist who specializes in guiding organizations and teams through transforming the design of distributed work, digital workplace, communities, customer and employee engagement, learning, communications, knowledge sharing, and collaboration practices and systems. With co-designed, people-centric solutions, she has helped multiple technology, non-profit, and higher education organizations improve how their staff, students, customers, partners, and prospects create and share knowledge, connect across boundaries, collaborate, and learn.

She is currently the Director of Knowledge and Collaboration at Sift and an adjunct instructor at Northwestern University in the MS in Learning and Organizational Change program (MSLOC). She co-leads the Chicago Online Community Professionals community of practice.

Keeley’s specialties include knowledge management, digital workplace, knowledge sharing, internal communications, social learning, and online community strategy, remote work, distributed work, community management, change management, learning and development, and human-centered design. She is adept at technology selection, implementation, and management.

Background

Education

• Northwestern University — MS, Learning and Organizational Change, 2009–2011
• Tufts University — B.A., International Relations & Spanish

Experience

• Sift — Director of Knowledge and Collaboration, 2021 — Present
• Northwestern University — School of Education and Social Policy, Master of Science in Learning & Organizational Change (MSLOC)

1. Adjunct Instructor, 2020 — Present
2. Assistant Director of Academic Services | Community Strategist, 2012–2015
3. Instructional Technology Coordinator. 2009–2011

• Chicago Online Community Professionals — Co-Founder, 2017 — Present
• Start Early — Director of Knowledge Sharing, 2018–2021
• Commvault — Community and Knowledge Management Strategist, 2016–2018
• MapR Technologies — Senior Manager/Community Strategist, 2015–2016
• Independent Consultant, 2007–2011
• Second Unitarian Church of Chicago — Director of Education, 2005–2007
• Endeavor Information Systems

1. Global Customer Support Manager, 2001–2005
2. Library Support Team Leader, 2000–2001
3. Library Support Analyst, 1999–2000

• PeopleSoft — Regional Sales Specialist/Higher Education Business Unit, 1997–1998
• World Learning — Director of Student Services/English as Second Language Programs, 1994–199

Profiles

• LinkedIn
• Personal Website
• Facebook
• Twitter

Content

• Portfolio
• LinkedIn Posts
• SlideShare

1. 1
2. 2

Communities

• Chicago Online Community Professionals

1. About
2. Posts

• SIKM Leaders Community — Posts

Articles

• LinkedIn Articles

1. Borderless Sift: Designing distributed work and knowledge sharing
2. IA before AI: How to go beyond search to build a knowledge hub
3. It’s not about you! Or is it? Creating online community content that serves your audience
4. Learning “beyond the classroom” within an enterprise social network system — ScienceDirect with Kimberly Scott and Jeff Merrell
5. Managing Boundaries Between Work and Family: Comparison of Satisfaction Levels Between Part-Time and Full-Time Working Mothers
6. Gather with Purpose: intersection of community, learning and technology with Alyssa Dyar

Presentations and Panels

• The Strategy and Organizational Design of Hybrid Work Webinar — Recording
• Design Projects for Knowledge Sharing & Learning
• Building a Knowledge, Networks and Collaboration Center of Excellence
• Preparing for Transformation with a Community Mindset
• Gaining and Maintaining Adoption in a Social Intranet with Tracy Maurer
• Connect, Enable and Inspire: Our Journey with a Modern Intranet with April King and Eliza Mixon — Recording
• Selling is a Team Sport: Integrating Jive-n into All Aspects of a Sales New Hire Program with April King and James Visher — Recording
• Using Jive to Enhance Your Organization’s Capacity to Learn, Innovate, and Activate Knowledge (recording of panel discussion)
• An incremental strategy for building relationships with your customers and prospects: MapR online community
• Learning Beyond the Classroom: Designing an Enterprise Social Networking System to Support a Program-Wide Community of Inquiry with Jeff Merrell
• Shift Your Mindset: Creating a Learning Culture on Your Team
• Learning out Loud: Networked & Social Learning
• Social Technology & Learning: Converting the Non-believer with Jeff Merrell
• EDCMOOC: A Maiden Voyage — Final Digital Artifact for Coursera E-Learning & Digital Cultures Course
• Case Study: Creating a Collaborative Learning Community

IA before AI: How to go beyond search to build a knowledge hub with Mary Ann Garwood

Organize, Curate, and Promote Key Resources for Your Audiences

• Content and Places need to:

1. Be well organized
2. Provide context
3. Connect employees to similar resources
4. Be situated in a larger ecosystem / information architecture
5. Be accurate and up-to-date

• Plan: Build Use Cases & Content Maps

1. Step 1: Planning the Use Case
2. Step 2: Content Map and Taxonomy before Design
3. Step 3: Design & Launch
4. Step 4: Comms Plan

• Create Consumable Content That Can Be Found

1. Titles Matter
2. Add Descriptions
3. Provide Additional Resources
4. Add Tags
5. Include Categories

• Curate the Content: Index Documents

1. Add a link to the associated index document
2. Embed key index documents on space landing pages
3. You don’t have to be a designer to create good index docs

• Promote in Search

1. Push key content to the top of search results
2. Only 2 pieces of content per keyword
3. Order matters
4. Separate multiple keyword(s) or phrases with commas
5. Multi-word phrases require an exact match

Facilitating Knowledge Sharing for Innovation with Margaret Sullivan and Beth Black

Knowledge Sharing Strategies

• To prevent knowledge loss

1. Knowledge Jam
2. Storytelling/Anecdote Circles
3. “Think Aloud” Concept Mapping
4. Apprenticeships
5. Coaching
6. Mentoring/Shadowing
7. Communities of Practice
8. Expertise Locators
9. Interviewing
10. Rules of Thumb
11. Social Network Analysis
12. Portals/Repositories/KM Technologies

• To increase efficiency

1. Small & Large Group Meetings / Workshops
2. Knowledge Jam
3. Storytelling
4. Lessons Learned
5. After Action Reviews
6. Social Network Analysis
7. Portals/Repositories/KM Technologies

• To promote innovation

1. Small & Large Group Meetings / Workshops
2. Knowledge Jam
3. Lessons Learned
4. After Action Reviews
5. Communities of Practice
6. Documentation
7. Expertise Locators
8. Mapping Human Knowledge
9. Portals/Repositories/KM Technologies
10. Rules of Thumb

Awards

2017: Jive Digital Transformation Award Winners — Commvault

2018: The Community Roundtable Network Pack Leader

“TheCR Network Pack Leader” awards the member who consistently leads the most discussions, online, in-person, and on virtual calls, and shows leadership around a topic or initiative in TheCR Network. TheCR Network Pack Leader: Keeley Hanson Sorokti, Community and Knowledge Management Strategist, Commvault

2018: Social Intranet Winner — Ragan’s Employee Communications Awards

A 2015 survey of employees working for data backup and recovery company Commvault found senior management was not doing enough to keep employees informed. The company’s intranet was little more than a collection of outdated SharePoint sites with no social functionality, no mobile access and a challenging user interface. The overhaul undertaken by the communications team has won first place in the “Social Intranet” category of Ragan’s 2018 Employee Communications Awards.

The effort was focused on providing easier access to the right content, and communication that engaged employees rather than simply pushed out messages, as well as creating a platform to build on the company’s culture. The result was a decision to adopt the Jive platform, which has social functionality built in.

Among the uses to which this functionality was put was a knowledge base and Q&A forums that simplified the process of asking and getting answers to questions; as a result, an average of 250 questions are answered each quarter on the page.

Social elements are also used to promote events. For example, during the company’s global customer conference, employees shared blog posts, photos and social content. During the 20th anniversary celebration, employees shared their own histories at the company and recognized their peers. The team also developed “People Side of the Business” social spaces on the intranet where employees could share ideas and concepts from beyond their own day-to-day work.

“Commvault Life” is one of these spaces, where employees share photos and write posts about company culture, including volunteer work, holiday parties and personal notes. Jive also enabled the Commvault Women in Technology group to launch a special interest group site on the intranet.

Ninety-eight percent of employees have adopted the new intranet, CONNECT, with active use increasing to 84 percent; average daily views grew 38 percent in CONNECT’s second year, and employee survey feedback has also been positive.

Congratulations to Brittany Lamb, Eliza Mixon, Keeley Sorokti, and Tracy Maurer.

2023: Internet Time Alliance Award in Memory of Jay Cross

Keeley Sorokti’s career as a knowledge management professional has been marked by her expertise in guiding organizations and teams through transformative journeys in designing and sustaining social learning, online community, and knowledge-sharing practices. Her impact can be seen in her work with multiple technology, non-profit, and higher education organizations, where she has improved knowledge creation and sharing, cross-boundary connections, collaboration, and learning experiences.

In addition to her role at Sift, Keeley Sorokti’s influence extends beyond her workplace. She actively shares her expertise and insights. As an instructor, she co-teaches the Creating and Sharing Knowledge class in the Master of Science in Learning and Organizational Change (MSLOC) program at Northwestern University. She co-founded the Chicago Online Community Professionals peer-to-peer community of practice and coworking group where KM, L&D, online community, and digital workplace professionals from around the world support each other as they work to transform the way we work, learn, and share knowledge in our organizations.

Keeley has shown a commitment to advancing the field of workplace learning and her passion for working out loud and making work visible exemplifies her humanistic approach to learning and performance.