Workflow

While searching for some stuff on knowledge work and knowledge workers for a workshop I am doing at the KCC Fringe with Piers Young I re-discovered Jay Cross' Internet Time Blog.  The article I stumbled across (I love stumbling on the web - you come across some amazing stuff) was on workflow. Here is an extract:

"Workflow is the convergence of work+flow to achieve an optimal balance of work results and individual fulfillment. Business culture is breaking free of the industrial-age mindset that bottom-line results and worker happiness are natural enemies. Work can be among life’s greatest joys; flow drives a loyal, over-achieving workforce. Workflow research investigates how work and flow can converge to replace an unproductive either/or situation with a mutually beneficial worldview of both/and[sic]."

Up until now I have regarded workflow as structured processes applied to moving information (primarily in the form of documents) around organisations. Most of the serious DM/KM tools have workflow features built-in but in my experience with clients these features are rarely used. But of  course this is an entirely different kind of workflow.

Further investigation reveals a business model, The Workflow Institute, based around the concept of workflow learning. Jay Cross is MD and the 'staff' includes Gloria Gery - one of the first people to bring us the exciting new field of Electronic Performance Support (EPS) which was the next big thing way back in the early nineties when I was running a business developing online help systems. EPS never really took off - at least not in Europe - and has largely been overtaken by the e-learning bandwagon. I think that e-learning people call it 'on demand learning' (sounds like an ad for IBM). 

Anyway, it's interesting to think about flow and specifically workflow in relation to knowledge work. More thoughts when my brain has made some more connections!