Are We There Yet? The Elusive Nature of Knowledge-Based Work

Whew. Aaaahhh. Ooohhhh.

You know that exquisite feeling of satisfaction you get after a long project is finally successfully finished? I'm taking an oh-so-brief respite to savor just such a moment.

We (finally) released the 2008 PMO 2.0 Survey Report today in conjunction with this morning's webcast. The whole effort started back in August with the survey design, so it is wonderful to stick the proverbial fork in that one. We had several hundred attendees register for the webcast, and I expect quite a few more will avail themselves of the opportunity to access the on-demand version that should be up by Monday. Some webcasts are more fun than others, and this one was pretty OK. Thanks to everyone who joined in! Lots and lots of great questions from attendees that we didn’t have time to get to and must ultimately be addressed, but not today.

OK -- I'm done savoring now. Back to work.

Besides the survey, I've also been writing -- a lot -- lately. Clearly not in the blog, but writing nonetheless. One topic I was working on recently seemed like a great thing to share with you, so let's take a moment to reflect on the winsome peculiarities of knowledge work. You know -- the things most of us do every day to create tangible deliverables out of little more than thin air and mental gymnastics. Fascinating. I touched on this topic about a year ago (see the 2/5/08 posting), but not from the same perspective.

We all know that fission is the process of turning matter into energy. Shouldn't the converse of that be true when we take mental energy and turn it into mass? If that is the case, then wouldn't we get incrementally smaller every time we turned our brain power into a project charter or a report? Duh, never mind -- I just realized the energy is actually conserved -- that's why a report is warm when it comes out of the laser printer. Of course, that means we've made something out of nothing, thus the violating the Theory of Relativity, so we are back around to the essence of knowledge work. Of course, knowledge work has always been around. Plato was a knowledge worker, as was Socrates, Shakespeare, Da Vinci, Confucius, Jesus and Mohammad. Back in those days, everyone else was pretty much farming, forging or fighting -- I remember. But in these modern times, the Knowledge Worker Club is decidedly less selective, so almost everyone has joined up. Trust me, it sure beats roofing.

Here's the thing about knowledge work when it comes to managing it -- it's really hard to develop objective specifications for what the end result is, or estimate how much time and effort it will take to get there. Oh wait, it gets better -- it’s just as difficult to definitively know when that elusive deliverable is actually achieved. In some larger organizations I have heard rumors of people who have actually made an entire career out of creating a single training curriculum.

Physical work is pretty easy to keep track of. Let's see, we have to run 200 feet of small bore piping from the elevated vertical fin hydration unit to subterranean ion converter pump, and it generally takes a day of effort to put in 50 feet. How are we doing? Heck, let’s measure it. Is that a good weld? Heck, let's x-ray it. Are we done yet? Heck, let’s sign it off and grab a beer. No problemo.

Have you ever tried to objectively observe knowledge work in progress? "Hey Sam, how's that thinking going?" "You look pretty wrinkled up and studious there and sure are a clicking a lot -- let's call it 50% complete." Can you really assess progress based on lines of code, page count or meeting duration?

It's the whole quality thing that really muddies the knowledge-based water and creates a dilemma. Besides being an inherent element of measuring progress, it is closely related to knowing when you are done. For example, I have to crank out seemingly endless presentations as a part of my job. No matter how many of these suckers I do, I get to that teeth-gnashing, gut wrenching moment of truth where I have to figure out whether it is "good enough." How is the flow and transition? Too many slides? Topics? Not enough? Do I need to tweak this one or that one a bit more? Should I re-do that graphic? I believe in ITSM terms we are talking about Utility and Fit for Purpose.

Of course, what I think of my product, or for that matter, what any other knowledge worker thinks of theirs, has little to do with the perceived quality of the results. That is left to the usually highly subjective opinions of others. Judgment -- how's that for a word that will extend any bit of knowledge work well beyond the point of reason?!

The way we try to control the duration of knowledge work and establish an inferred level of quality is by applying arbitrary deadlines. "Hrumph -- Johnson, I need that report on the Jones account on my desk by Friday!" Now, Johnson probably knows that Surly Boss probably isn't going to use the Jones report over the weekend, but by definition, the maximum investment in creating that report is now capped at whatever time remains between now and Friday; so is the level of quality. But what if Johnson has to let the Tom, Dick and Harry proposal slide in order to keep up with the Jones account?

A friend of mine and one of our consultants, Dennis McComb, relates a story from his EDS days about a harried staff member who came into his office, laid out all the tasks she had been assigned on his desk, and asked, "Which of these do you not need to be done in a quality manner?"

OK, if you are still reading this, then you are undoubtedly expecting some kind of a big payoff, right? I'll be the last one to say I have all the answers on this one. I struggle with managing my own work, just like everyone else. Sprinkled throughout the blog are snippets that help, but The Answer is not yet apparent, not to me anyway. The intent here is more to remind ourselves that the environment we work in today is a brave new world, where old rules and old expectations do not always apply and the new ones are not yet fully baked.