Guidelines

DEC 1

Submission Period Begins
JAN 30

Submission Period Ends
FEB 14

Peer Review Completed/Top Case Stories Announced
MAY (TBD)

Case Stories Presented at unConference

Guidelines and Criteria

How to Enter | Evaluation Criteria | Awards and Incentives | Important Dates

The Knowledge Management Impact Challenge is a collaborative learning process to accelerate knowledge exchange around shared challenges and approaches to assess the impact of investments in knowledge management and learning. Encouraging practitioners to describe and share their experience through a short case story is one of the primary ways the KM Impact Challenge proposes to strengthen our collective understanding of what works. Please see the Overview and Framing Document for more background.

How to Enter

The KM Impact Challenge is open to all types of individuals and organizations from all countries. We encourage practitioners from around the world to share short case stories (about two pages) describing their experience assessing their knowledge management activities. All case stories will be considered official entries and shared publicly on the KM Impact Challenge website (http://kdid.org/kmic) that:

Reflect the theme of the challenge and in some way describe efforts to measure or assess activities related to knowledge and learning
Are submitted in English via the online entry form

Please submit your case story between the dates of December 1, 2010 and January 30, 2011. The submission period is over. Case Stories are in peer review.

To submit a case story, select the “Submit Story” button on the KM Impact Challenge home page. You will be asked to Log In or Create an Account. Once you have created an account and logged in, you will be asked to fill out a short case story form (less than 1200 words or about two pages) by simply responding to questions in an interview style format. An individual or organization may submit up to three case stories.

The main questions that you will be asked to respond to:

Describe the KM initiative
Describe the approaches utilized to measure / assess this KM initiative
What was the purpose or motivation for assessing this KM initiative?
What were the most important lessons learned from the assessment process?
What would you do differently next time?
What advice would you give to others based on your experience?
What do you think are the main unanswered questions or challenges related to this field of work?

There are some additional guiding questions included under each main question in the online form which will help you to shape your response. After initially submitting your case story, you may return throughout the submission period to edit and improve your case story. Read through the Writing Tips for suggestions to help you write your story. See the Frequently Asked Questions for more detailed guidance for creating an account, logging in and submitting your story. Send a request for assistance at any time to kmicinfo@kdid.org

Evaluation Criteria and Process

While the intent of the KM Impact Challenge is not to pick winners, we do believe that a light peer-review process is a valuable way to filter and focus attention on descriptive, highly relevant experiences. A voluntary Technical Advisory Group has been formed by more than 30 subject matter specialists representing diverse disciplinary and geographic backgrounds. The Technical Advisory Group members will review case story entries using the criteria listed below and scoring each criteria on a scale of 1 to 10. An aggregate score from multiple reviewers will help identify case stories of higher relative quality that merit deeper exploration and follow-up. The following four evaluation criteria will be used:

Clarity: Does the case story reflect the overall theme of the challenge? Does it clearly illustrate how a knowledge and learning initiative or KM investment was assessed, monitored or evaluated?

Analysis: Does the case story reflect on the relative strengths and weaknesses of the tool/approach used? Does the case story identify key lessons that can be used to improve future practice?

Creativity: Does the case story describe an innovative approach or novel adaptation of an established methodology (e.g., supplementing outcome mapping with logical framework)? Does the case story present the activity or experience in a creative way?

Replicability: Does the case story present practical approaches, lessons learned or advice that can be used by others to improve their knowledge management assessment practice?

Awards and Incentives—why share your story?

Win an Early Entry Award. All case story entries received by January 9, 2011 will automatically be entered into a drawing to select one person for a USD$1000 professional development award. This award can be applied towards the tuition or registration fees for an approved training course or conference of your choice related to knowledge management and learning. Winning the Early Entry Award does not preclude you from being selected for a Travel Award based on the peer review process. All case stories will be equally reviewed at the completion of the entry period. The Early Entry Award winner will be announced January 10, 2011.
Receive an expense paid Travel Award to share your story at the KM Impact Challenge unConference in Washington, DC (proposed for March 2011). At least five case story authors will be selected via the peer-review process to receive support to present their work and learn from colleagues at the March 2011 unConference in Washington, DC
Raise the visibility of your work and contribute to advancing good practice standards around what works. All case stories submitted will be accessible online as part of a growing shared-knowledge base on the topic
This initial set of activities will lead to various follow-up activities including a round of small grants to further investigate and refine some of the methodologies uncovered by the Challenge that capture return on investing in learning and KM