The tribe that forgot
I have a working hypothesis: bad organisations are bad at being stupid. Or, to invert it, good organisations are adept at being stupid.
By that, I mean that good organisations value memory - the collective memory. They go to lengths to make tacit knowledge explicit and shared. They can afford to seem “stupid,” comfortably backed by a deep well of knowledge that can be recalled at any moment, by anyone.
In these organisations, the trail of project failures, challenges, and successes is meticulously documented. Decisions are logged, not just left to linger in the minds of a few. Knowledge doesn’t walk out the door.
In consulting, we often undervalue organisational memory. Unless knowledge serves as a case study (for sales credibility) or a blog post (for marketing clout), the lessons we gather tend to disperse among project teams. Once a team has ‘rolled off,’ that hard-won insight is rarely recalled. I think that’s such a waste!
Some of this is about continuity, but mostly it’s about incentives. Without incentives, there’s no drive to capture knowledge. Without that drive, it just isn’t valued.
History has a lesson here. According to historians, one of the primary reasons an indigenous Tasmanian tribe became extinct was that they forgot fire. The elder generations understood fire’s value for survival, capturing its techniques, craft, and significance in stories handed down over generations. But gradually, these stories were devalued. Eyes fixed on the future, new generations forgot the lessons of the past. Fire slipped from collective memory, and with it, the tribe’s existence. Bonkers!
So how do we ensure our own critical knowledge isn’t lost in the churn?
We can start by creating and fiercely protecting the time and space for teams to document. Write, write, write. Some of the best teams I’ve worked with treat running notes, weeknotes, and one-pagers as gold.
Then let’s protect continuity at all costs. Shared experience and histories should bridge from project to project. Long-lived teams should be the norm. Give people the chance to build, own, and value a shared history.
Finally if restructuring is needed (hint, it probably isn’t), think creatively. Don’t reduce talented people to replaceable assets. Most of an employee’s value lies in the knowledge they’ve built over time and share across the organisation. This compounds over time, but is often invisible until it’s gone.
Let’s not forget about fire.
by KJ