Step 1: Meeting or Information Event. The meeting proceeds by an agenda and is facilitated if required. The meeting is managed as an information event as well as a work session. Use WorkWalls™ to express concepts verbally and graphically, and to provide a group memory of the process. Following the meeting, this “raw” documentation is put into a Knowledge Base [see step 3].

Step 2: Documentation. Typically, a “realtime” documentation is produced first, that describes the work in the order that it was developed. Then, if required, this material is used to produce a second work product in the form of a plan, specification, flow chart, diagram, summary, spreadsheet, instruction, etc., or any combination of these.

Step 3: Knowledge Base. A simple knowledge base may consist of documents organized in a series of folders; a more elaborate method involves numbering each document and setting up an electronic storage and retrieval database. Ideally, a support staff of knowledge workers manage, update, and amplify the information and its usefulness.

Step 4: Distribution. The documentation, in whole or in part, is distributed on a “need to know” basis. Distribution should balance the requirements of maximum information sharing, information overload, and privacy. A Ten-Step Process for Making Meetings and Design Sessions More Effective Ten Step Knowledge Work Process Model

Step 5: Tracking System. This is to follow up on the information distributed. Tracking means, simply, that you keep track of who got what information, for what reasons, and with what response.

Step 6: Feedback. Feedback from your core group should determine the subject and/or timing of the next meeting. Each recipient of the information is called and asked a series of questions to determine the value and relevance of the information. Refine the process here, to insure that you’re getting the right information, to the right people, at the right time.

Step 7: Knowledge Base. Feedback is organized and put in the Knowledge Base and thus available for the next iteration of work. & Step 8: Process Design/Agenda. Based on the information gathered, the project leader or facilitator designs the next meeting or design session. (Others models in this set may be useful for this process).

Step 9: “Read Ahead”. The project leader or facilitator distributes an agenda and “read ahead” to the participants prior to the session. The “read ahead” updates everyone on the “news” of the project and includes any Knowledge Base information that will be useful.

Step 10: Meeting or Information Event. Participants come prepared; the focus is designing together, using the talents, vantage points and experience of each member. The project leader or facilitator guides the group to complete the current cycle of work, thus ending one cycle of design, and beginning the next.

For more information on this model visit the MG Taylor website at: www.mgtaylor.com/mgtaylor/glasbead/tenstep.htm

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