From Learn@WELL to KM@TREND

By Marieke Adank, IRC JPO based at TREND.

To improve the services it delivers to the sector, the DFID sponsored WELL Resource Centre aims to strengthen its network through capacity building. To achieve this, a series of modules has been designed, called Learn@WELL. One of these modules is on Knowledge Management. In October 2005, the Ghanaian Resource Centre TREND, which is one of the Southern WELL partners, organised an in-house workshop to go through this module.

Following this workshop, the objectives of the Knowledge Management initiative within TREND were established as follows:

• to improve internal communication, which will improve work efficiency of staff
• improve internal post project data / information / knowledge storage and management
• to profile TREND as a Resource Centre in the Ghanaian water and sanitation sector
• to stimulate knowledge management within the sector

KMC: A Committee to champion KM within TREND

TREND decided to establish a Knowledge Management Committee (KMC) to stimulate and steer knowledge management within the organisation. This three (wo)men Committee consists of the Business Manager, the Deputy Managing Director and one staff member.

In order to improve internal communication, the KMC organises and facilitates monthly planning and sharing meetings. In the morning of this full day meeting, the activities of the previous month are evaluated and a planning is made in a participatory way for the activities of the coming month. In the afternoon session, there is room for two sharing or capacity building sessions, which can be filled in by staff members. These sessions are meant to facilitate joint learning and to build the capacity of staff to produce high quality knowledge products.

With its rich experience and ongoing work in the Ghana water and sanitation sector, TREND has learnt many lessons that could be useful to the wider water and sanitation sector. In order to share this knowledge and these experiences, TREND will have to capture these in knowledge products, which will have to be marketed and disseminated. To come up with subjects for new products and how to divide the work over the staff members, the KMC facilitates a planning session during the morning session of the monthly meeting.

When Knowledge products have been developed by staff members, the KMC is responsible for the quality control, the final editing and production of Knowledge Products (either hard copy production or web publication). Dissemination and marketing of the knowledge products is also handled by the KMC. Marketing activities include:

• Issuing / doing scoping studies to get a good idea of the market and to raise interest for TREND’s products
• Produce and distribute (cheap) freebees to promote the website
• Exhibit products at events (for example the Mole conference)
• Advertise new products on the website and in a sector newsletter

TREND has furthermore revived its internal newsletter, which is being compiled on a weekly basis by the KMC. The newsletter gives the KMC the opportunity to gain experience in newsletter compilation and to build writing skills. With these skills and experiences, the KMC might expand the scope and outreach of the newsletter in the future towards the wider sector.

The KMC is responsible for project and programme progress monitoring. To facilitate this, an internal project monitoring database has been developed. After a project is finished, the KMC makes sure that knowledge products are produced, disseminated and archived.

Scaling up and scaling out Knowledge Management in Ghana

The TREND KMC could play an important role in promoting organisational (within organisations) and institutional (within the sector) knowledge management in Ghana. It could share its lessons learnt and experiences with other organisations to stimulate similar processes in other organisations in the sector. This could be done by developing a Communication / Knowledge Management Module for the Ghana Water and Sanitation Sector, based on the WELL module and lessons learnt of the TREND KMC.

Furthermore, the TREND KM(C) model could be scaled up to sector level. Many of the internal processes within TREND facilitated by the KMC could be duplicated on sector level, facilitated by the KM Task Force / Steering Committee. These processes could include

• Sector wide programme / project monitoring
• Newsletter compilation and publication
• Coordination and sharing meetings / workshops to improve communication within the sector
• Knowledge product development, production, dissemination and marketing

Where the KMC is facilitating the processes within TREND, the KM Task Force / Steering Committee could do this on sector level. The responsibilities of the TREND staff members within the internal processes would be similar to the responsibilities of the sector organisations in sector wide KM processes. For example, sector organisation could be responsible for sector knowledge products, much like TREND staff members being responsible for the production of TREND knowledge products. The KM Task Force / Steering Committee would be responsible for quality control, production, dissemination and marketing, like the KMC is responsible for this within TREND.