Two students in the Schar School’s highly regarded Organization Development and Knowledge Management (ODKM) master’s degree program, Alice Carpenter-Pierce and Angela D’lorio, have been selected to be speakers at the KM Showcase 2020, the field’s major conference of the year.
The two-day event, hosted by the Florida-based Knowledge Management Institute, takes place in Arlington, Va., on March 4 and 5, and brings together knowledge managers and other experts from around the country, including those from government, non-government organizations, nonprofits, and private industry.
What they have in common is a drive to continue to develop this increasingly important—and increasingly complex—discipline. Knowledge management calls on an enterprise’s leadership to be creative and analytical in using available content, information, and technology and connecting it to the right employees for the greater good of the company. Knowledge management affects entire organizations, from C-level executives to IT managers to human resources departments.
It’s quite an honor to address an audience of thought leaders, executives, and consultants, said Carpenter-Pierce and D’lorio.
“Considering I’m a relative newcomer to the field of Knowledge Management—I attended my first KM Showcase just last year—I was surprised and honored to have my presentation selected,” said Carpenter-Pierce. “I’m taking advantage of this opportunity to mature a model I have been developing for over a year, to share what I’ve learned with others, and find opportunities where my knowledge and expertise could be applied.”
“At first, I was a bit intimidated by the idea,” admitted D’lorio, who is the Knowledge Management and Strategy lead for a federal contractor. “I think to some extent I’m still a bit nervous about exposing my passion for this work to a room full of strangers, but it is something I care deeply about. What I hope for as a result of my appearance is that others feel inspired to have meaningful conversations and appreciate that leadership and knowledge management are more than just a process, but a way of being that impacts more than just the bottom line.”
Their professor, the director of the Schar School’s Organization Development and Knowledge Management program Tojo Thatchenkery, said Carpenter-Pierce and D’lorio’s appearance at the conference is representative of what they have been doing as students.
“One of the distinguishing features of the ODKM program is to encourage students to share new ideas and learning to the larger community of knowledge management practitioners,” he said. “ODKM students Alice Carpenter-Pierce and Angela D’lorio have been enthusiastic champions for popularizing the KM field to an even larger community of management professionals.”
D'lorio, who will share her presentation with KM Institute instructor John Hovell, will explore “conversational leadership.”
“It may sound a bit lofty, but it’s my belief that even the most innocuous conversation can deeply impact the person or persons we have it with,” she said. “In our conversation we’re going to introduce our audience to the concept of ‘conversational leadership,’ demonstrate what it looks like in action, and offer questions for consideration as we all move forward from the session.”
“Conversational leadership,” she said, “is motivated by the notion that in a world of increasing socio-technological complexity, we must find a way to develop and foster meaningful connections that empower all humans to grow and thrive.”
As for Carpenter-Pierce, her presentation will tackle the challenges created when an organization has made a sticky mistake in addressing a situation.
“I call this the ‘silver bullet paradox’ because the organization bought into tools or platforms to fix an issue or inefficiency, but they actually cause more problems than they fix,” she said. “Because little to no strategy was conceived of, or planning was done, the tools fall flat and cause more confusion. But the organization isn’t willing to take a loss on the tools; they want to implement them. Now what?”
She may be new to the field, but Carpenter-Pierce has already gained enough experience to present not one but three case studies “from my own experience where this approach was successful at turning around a failed roll-out and helping teams and organizations reap the benefits of the tools.”