Imagine a bottle full to the brim with a person trying to
pour more water into it. Now let that bottle represent your
brain, and let the water inside it represent the sum of your knowledge and
memories. Let the water being poured in represent new
knowledge and new memories that are quite important and need
to be remembered. Unfortunately, a lot of the new stuff drains down the side
of the bottle.
But mixed in with this new knowledge that isn't getting into
your brain are memories of lesser importance which your mind
discards (forgets), like a snake shedding its skin. This is
necessary to make room for the new knowledge you really do
need to remember, knowledge that does make it in.
This is a natural process which is necessary for survival,
and according to Daniel Vekstein, from Ben-Gurion University
in Israel, it's also necessary for organizations.
Organizations acquire shared knowledge in the form of
routines, skills, technologies, and relationships, and yet
they must also make progress. Organizations must learn new
and better ways to do things, but just like the full bottle,
in order to fit in new knowledge, organizations must discard
knowledge, too. We must forget things as an organization.
Vekstein conducted a study of the automobile industry and
carefully considered the relationships between learning,
forgetting, and business performance. He demonstrated that
learning and forgetting in a careful balance leads to
sustained progress, sustained competitive advantage, and he
offered his opinions of two crucial factors that help
maintain a healthy balance.
The first factor is individualism, and the problem, he says,
is that we have too much of it.
We stimulate individualism in a variety of ways. We champion
the rugged individual, but in our firms, it retards our
forgetting. Individuals guard their special knowledge and
are reluctant to let go of it, even if it supports
technologies that are outdated. This inhibits people from
participating in collective learning, and causes resistance.
Vekstein believes that this resistance to "forgetting" is the
most important cause of organizational inertia.
The answer, Vekstein says, lies in promoting a group identity
among employees and discouraging individualism. Abandoning,
for example, employee-of-the-month recognition programs.
The second factor Vekstein describes is benchmarking. We
don't have enough of it.
Benchmarking identifies ways competitors are better, faster,
or cheaper and then expresses these improvements in terms of
targets. Meeting these targets allows one's own firm to
match and overtake the competitor. Vekstein cites this
example of a benchmark from the automobile industry: if
Toyota can manufacture an automobile engine that has an
average life of 150,000 miles and costs $2,000, GM might
set a target of its own to introduce a motor that survives
175,000 miles and costs $1,500.
Benchmarking harnesses innovation and group competition as a
way of motivating and focusing employees' energies.
Your competitors represent a real threat. They would like to
put you out of business. Benchmarking calls attention to
this external threat, and it helps employees overcome
resistance to forgetting and excessive individualism.
Benchmarking focuses people onto the task of innovating and
results in vigorous efforts to change. This, says Vekstein,
creates a healthy balance between learning and forgetting.
Managers can take a lesson from Professor Vekstein. Find
ways to stimulate group performance and focus benchmarking
goals on attracting customers and presenting your goods and
services in attractive ways.
Reference: Vekstein, Daniel (1998) Managing Knowledge and Corporate Performance: an Empirical Analysis of the World Automobile Industry. Omega, International Journal of Management Science, 26 (5), 551-568.
Business Practice Findings, by James Larsen, Ph.D.
Learning and Forgetting
A careful balance of learning and forgetting leads to improved performance.