What Numbers Can't Do

Recently I had the interesting experience of reading survey results relating to a subject I actually knew something about. At first blush, the numbers were quite impressive. And then I read a little more closely and discovered that the presentation gave the impression of results that were better than warranted by reality. Since just the "bare numbers" had been reported, important context and nuance were lost. As a result, the story the numbers told was a little misleading.

So how do we restore context, nuance and meaning? And, more importantly, how do we help initiate needed change within our organizations? According to the folks at Anecdote, the answer lies in telling good stories and then listening properly to those stories:

Surveys and metrics can uncover trouble in an organisation, but they usually don't help you identify the reasons for dysfunctions, let alone generate the resolve to springboard people into action. Instead, learn to use stories as listening posts and tap into the emotion to spark action. From time immemorial, stories have contained collective lessons in condensed form. When gathered and examined, stories that are told in your organisation reveal important themes and patterns that in turn indicate effective solutions.

To be clear, I'm not trying to trash quantitative analysis. However, I do believe there are some things that can be communicated best by numbers and other things that can be communicated accurately only through narrative. Be very sure that when you make your choices about what to measure, how to measure and how to report the results, you choose the right tools and methods. If you cut corners here you will compromise your project and, possibly, your credibility. Why risk it?

[Thanks to Stan Garfield for pointing out the Anecdote post.]

Storytelling and Law Firm KM

As I was writing my earlier posts recounting Dave Snowden's concept of "fragmented knowledge" and Fred Nikols' strong recommendation that we focus knowledge management on human interactions and development rather than structured content, I must admit that I experienced mild anxiety about the implications of this for law firm knowledge management.

For years we've been chasing the Holy Grail of model documents and precedents, practice guides and practice notes (best practice materials), checklists and timetables, and the like. These are all examples of structured knowledge that is difficult and expensive to capture, but is so highly valued within a law firm. I imagined having to tell our management committee that rather than working on a record number of model documents this year, I'd be spending my time collecting anecdotes from lawyers. Next, I worried about whether storytelling lawyers actually existed. And then it struck me, if lawyers are humans and if Snowden and Nikols are right about knowledge and human behavior, then even lawyers must engage in storytelling to exchange knowledge. Based on this very narrow view of human beings (or homo narrans, as Snowden refers to them) and some further reflection, I'm happy to report that lawyers are human (really) and do tell stories.

And when do they tell their stories? At practice group meetings, when lawyers provide an oral debriefing on the highlights, challenges and lessons learned of recent or current matters. In formal continuing legal education sessions, when more experienced lawyers use their stories to illustrate the legal points they need to convey in order to help their colleagues master new developments in the law. When lawyers do pitches, they share with prospective clients the stories of their successes with similarly-situated clients. It's these stories that help the prospective client envision being a client of the storytelling lawyer.

So what are the implications for law firm knowledge management? It would suggest that we should broaden our focus beyond capturing written materials in document management systems and Portals since it is unlikely that many of these valuable stories will ever be written down and stored there. Instead, we should collect, organize and distribute video clips of these stories that can be played and replayed at the point of need. Further, we should consider investing in search engines that can parse, profile and index audio-visual content. It also means that we need to bring the rigor of model document and best practice document creation to the art of storytelling. We must train our lawyers to tell stories well -- stories that have a point that is clearly articulated and easily understood.

These are challenges that require law firm knowledge managers to take a turn from the well-trodden path of managing documents. It promises to be a very interesting journey.