Inspiration and stories
KS News, events & blogs

The World Appreciative Inquiry Conference is held every three years. The last decade, the conference was...

The global challenge of climate change calls for innovation in the way we live, the way we do business and in the way we solve tough challenges both environmentally and socially. In the last few months there has been a growing awareness of this in a number of sectors, with more conversations on how we engage with each other to create an environment where ideas can become innovation. One of these, forms part of the South African government’s...

Design Thinking is a culture and an approach that supports you in trying out new services, processes and products. People from Kessels & Smit met up with Elias Barrasch from Invented Here to talk about and experiment with design thinking.

In March 2011, I had the pleasure of being invited by Nancy Dixon in Washington DC - joining two other Knowledge Management stars Nick Milton and Karl Wiig – on a ‘Deep Dive’ to support international health organisations in Knowledge Management. It was a fantastic workshop with great learning and connections made. Here I sum up some of the ideas I shared (you can also download the pdf file here). On the importance of story, play, imagination and visioning.

Zelfgestuurd leren, Informeel leren, netwerkleren… Organisaties zien vandaag heel wat ontwikkelingen gebeuren als ze kijken naar het leren van hun professionals en daarmee ook de kennisproductiviteit binnen hun eigen organisatie. En elk van deze ontwikkelingen heeft zijn invloed op de manier waarop we leren en kennisdeling in onze organisatie ondersteunen. Vorige week begeleidde ik samen met Eefje Teeuwisse, Naomi den Besten en Katrien Massa een tweedaagse bij Océ – International Training Centre rond deze uitdagingen. Samen met 100 professionals op het vlak van leren en ontwikkelen bouwden we inzichten rond de implicaties van ontwikkelingen als zelfsturing, informeel leren, sociale media etc. en vertaalden we deze naar nieuwe opleidings- en leerpraktijken. Dit zowel voor externe gebruikers van printers, als voor interne klanten van de sales- en marketingafdeling en de operational companies. Het werd een enorm boeiende tweedaagse met heel wat dynamiek, innovatieve ideeën en prachtige uitwerkingen. En daarbij is één reflectie mij het hele weekend blijven puzzelen.

In March, I attended a three-day meeting on ‘participatory leadership’ and ‘conversations that matter’, organised by...

Knowledge is increasingly being seen as the most important strategic asset in organizations and a crucial resource to achieve sustainable competitive advantage. Given that a significant amount of organizational knowledge resides in the minds and interactions of employees, it is important for organizations to understand what motivates employees to share existing knowledge, to produce new knowledge and what prevents them from doing so.

Over the past few months we’ve had lots of fun sharing the K&S story through the MIX competition partnered by the Human Capital Institute. As we know, we got through to the semi-finals – here is what happened next!

We are truly delighted: our Kessels & Smit story has been chosen as one of the ten most ‘inspiring, challenging and surprising’ examples of innovation in management from around the globe. This was announced as we were selected into the semi-finals of the HCI M-prize - a prestigious competition with judges such as Gary Hamel, Marcus Buckingham and other pioneering minds in organisational and management development.

September 2010 war für die Entwicklung von Kessels & Smit in Deutschland ein wichtiger Monat. Das...