The ShareFair scheduled for January 2009 will be another step in our path towards finding innovative ways to do our jobs more efficiently and effectively.
The most asked question when we try to introduce Knowledge Sharing approaches is: "If this does not help me do my job, don't talk to me about it!". Fair enough! We are all busy, some very very busy. We have no time for "nice to have's", we only want to learn about things, those "need to have's" that are going to make us work smarter and have more impact.
Well, Knowledge Sharing is about learning to do things more smartly...and have fun doing it! There is always a better way of doing things, you can always find someone who is facing an issue like yours, who has been through the same situation and has learned a good way to deal with it....as the old saying goes...it is not what you know...it is who you know! A single tree does not make a forest!
So, we create opportunties to learn from others, to build parthernships, not to waste energy, time and money trying to reinvent the wheel (and getting frustrated while doing it!).
We have been doing a number of things already: from designing, developing and delivering a very succesful Knowledge Sharing workshop, and giving an opportunity to our staff to learn and experiment to carrying out a second workshop with a partner: FAO KS Workshop, to planning to deliver more next year.
We have been working collaboratively develop a Knowledge Sharing toolkit to empower those who want to find ways of doing things differently.
We have been extending the application of innovative knowledge sharing approaches to improve the impact of our research along the whole cycle.
So, it is not a once off experiment. It is a set of strategic interventions.
The Knowledge Fair in January is a new step towards building the momentum in the CGIAR to use knowledge sharing approaches to do things smart!