Issue 11

Structure

Quick thoughts about how content lives in systems

I was recently doing some content modeling, and I wanted to attach a location to some entities. Two were event types in two different content management systems (CMSes) and the third entity was an organization in a third CMS. In the first CMS, I used a text field and just planned to use the syntax of “City, State, Country” (for a personal project). But the other two CMSes had “location” field types available, with either address data or latitude/longitude coordinates. Nonetheless, in these content, I did not use the location field types and used a text field for the same syntax as the first CMS.

I was very tempted to get more complex in my content model because the organization modeled in the organization content type might have multiple locations.

However, I chose not to get more detailed in my models because of a principle I picked up from Dan McCreary at the Knowledge Graph Conference in 2021 called the edge of chaos.

The idea is that the edge of chaos is where order and disorder (chaos) meet.

In a content model (or a knowledge graph) there are things which could be modeled at the cost of additional complexity and with the payoff of additional business capabilities.

For my use case, I really just needed a text label for a location, so it’s overkill to model the location data more specifically. Later, I may want to plot locations on a map and have information about each location. To get that business capability, I’d need to move location information from “chaos” to “order” by modeling it in more detail.

I find this framing very useful for managing scope and avoiding my desire to model all the things. It’s also been valuable for communicating with teammates and stakeholders and even for roadmapping future improvements. In my recent example that might be voiced with something like: “Right now, we know we could do more around locations, but we’ll dig into it later. We will go with what we have for now. We may need more location-related content capability in 12 months, so we may start modeling it next quarter.”

Have you ever heard of the edge of chaos? Would you find this framing helpful?

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Soft skills

A look at the less-tangible characteristics and skills that can expand your influence

Throughout the course of a particular project, job, or career, you’re likely going to develop some expertise that your colleagues may not have. Maybe you know who the right people are to talk to about something or to make things happen. Maybe you know how to do something that others don’t know. Maybe you know the why (or when, or where) of something that nobody else knows.

What you do with that expertise—that knowledge—speaks to the soft skills you’re developing.

Specifically, make sure that you’re not guilty of knowledge hoarding or knowledge hiding. Don’t intentionally or unintentionally withhold valuable knowledge.

That’s not being a team player. If intentional, that’s being an empire builder, playing the nasty politics that will come back to bite you. If unintentional, you’ve got room to improve. See 9 signs your organization has a knowledge hoarding problem from Coveo.

Instead, strive for knowledge donation and be willing to share when requested in knowledge collection.

In my career, I’ve donated knowledge via email lists, chat tools, internal company blog posts, “brownbag” sessions, internal conference presentations, and externally in articles, papers, conference presentations, meetup presentations, panel sessions, podcast appearances, and so on. I’ve had office hours for knowledge collection, and I’ve even done some formal mentoring.

These things take time, but they’re good for your team, good for you, and can even be good for your industry.

Two questions:

1. How do you practice knowledge donation and knowledge collection?
2. What steps can you take next week to improve the knowledge sharing culture in your organization?

Top of mind

Things that are bouncing around in my head as I synthesize a range of ideas

John Collins

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