The most recent entrant in the cottage industry of cognitive psychology books, Daniel Leviten’s new book The Organized Mind, attempts to help us sort through the vast amount of information demanding our attention daily. Leviten claims we are victims of our evolutionary and inadequate attentional…

Senior technical experts can be in short supply, especially if your organization has lots of projects underway. New employees and novices may not know where to turn or may be reluctant to bother or look stupid in front of an expert. One way to cope with a shortage of experts is to appeal to the…

It is probably old news to you, but I was taken aback to read an article in Wall Street Journal (WSJ) written August 4, 2014 by Laura Stevens. It said that Fed Ex and UPS use the U.S. Postal Service to deliver many of their ground packages, and Amazon is leveraging our dear old USPS, too. According…

I always have my eye open for research that might tell us more about how to leverage the expertise in our organizations, from novices to experts.  I stumbled across The Secret Life of the Grown up Brain (2010) I appreciated the highly readable, research-based and optimistic account of the (…

In my last post on making the most of technical expertise, I talked about three knowledge gaps technical leaders are contending with: turning mid-career employees (aka “nex’perts”) into experts, speeding up the learning curve for novices and new hires, and creating new innovations and solutions.…

It is no secret around APQC that I am a big fan of Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla Motors and CEO and Chief Designer SpaceX and SolarCity. Not only is he a remarkable engineer, designer, and visionary (check out the products he has developed here), Musk is committed to making the world a better place…

On February 25, 2014 Carla O’Dell, CEO of APQC and knowledge management (KM) expert, led a conversation with Adam Grant, Wharton professor and author of the best-selling Give and Take (A Revolutionary Approach to Success) and APQC’s KM Advanced Working Group. The following is part two of that…

On February 25, 2014 Carla O’Dell, CEO of APQC and knowledge management (KM) expert, led a conversation with Adam Grant, Wharton professor and author of the best-selling Give and Take (A Revolutionary Approach to Success) and APQC’s KM Advanced Working Group. The following is a condensed version of…

I would like to share some intriguing findings from a hot new APQC research project:  turning the shortage of experts in scientific, technical, and engineering specialties on its ear and asking how organizations can leverage the experts they have.  This is the first in a series of posts…