Knowledge as an Action adding Value

This week I went to a presentation made by Prof. Milan Zeleny (Professor of Management Systems at Fordham University), one of the fathers of the Data Information Knowledge and Wisdom (DIKW) Hierarchy at the knowledge domain.

One of the interesting things at the presentation was vision of the difference between Information and Knowledge looking through another glass. For him, Information is the description of action while knowledge is the coordination of action. This way Knowledge is always tacit because once you describe it, it is Information. To be knowledge again, this information must be transformed into an action.

In my opinion this is a very interesting point of view because most of the time we see a lot of information available but nothing is done using it. When someone gets the Information and starts an action, then we can say that this person knows how to do something.

If Information triggering action builds knowledge, and if we can measure the value added (to external customers, to users, etc) by each action, than we can measure the value of the knowledge being used. Nowadays where the Information and Information Technologies are becoming commodities, as they are highly available, the knowledge, or in other words the coordination of actions using those IT and Information, can be the difference to add more value to the business.

Knowledge, Innovation and Wisdom are measurable, and then must add value to your business.

Regards,
Alex Lopes