Decentralized Knowledge Management Strategy Offers Success at Grant Thornton

By Lauren Trees on Mar 25, 2013

APQC loves to look at thriving knowledge management programs and analyze the secrets behind their success. I recently had the pleasure of doing this at audit, tax, and advisory services firm Grant Thornton LLP. Grant Thornton formalized its KM function in 2007 as part of an effort to improve firm-wide access to knowledge and enhance sharing across geographical locations. Despite the global economic downturn that ensued, the organization was able to grow its capabilities quickly and embed knowledge sharing and reuse in key business processes.

APQC just published a detailed case study describing Grant Thornton’s knowledge management journey. As part of the data-gathering process, I sat down with Chief Operating Officer Lou Grabowsky and asked him how his firm had achieved so much KM success so quickly. Here’s what he said:

1. Alignment with business strategy—KM made sense at Grant Thornton because it helped the firm fulfill client expectations and grow its business. “There has to be intimate integration and alignment with strategy,” Grabowsky said. “If you’re doing it because it sounds good or feels good or you know it’s important but you can’t get to it with your strategy, then it’s not going to work.”
2. Support from the top—According to Grabowsky, “Our CEO went way out on a limb with this and stayed with it even when the times got more challenging and it would have been easy to look at KM as a cost exercise and start slashing and burning. He didn’t do that and we didn’t do that: We never lost our commitment that this was the right direction.”
The right person to run the program—Grabowsky emphasized Chief Knowledge Officer Tamara Smith’s ongoing leadership of the KM program as a critical element of success. Smith and her team understood the challenges and were able to make a big impact with a relatively small budget.
3. Strong processes—An effective KM implementation requires clear processes and road maps dovetailed with appropriate change management. Grabowsky asserted that Smith and her partner’s years of KM experience enabled them to put the right framework in place.
4. A decentralized strategy—Recognizing that a national team could not understand the needs of every sector and service line, Grant Thornton opted for a decentralized model for KM. According to Grabowsky, the decentralization has enabled the firm to be more agile in moving toward KM maturity, especially in the areas of the business that benefit most from knowledge sharing and reuse.
5. Accountability—The decentralized structure worked because leaders out in the business felt accountable for driving adoption. “It was clear you couldn’t opt out,” Grabowsky said. Rather than focusing on enforcement, the firm incorporated KM into its measurement and reward packages, providing positive motivation for leaders to get on board.

If you want to see a great example of how to get a KM program off the ground, read the case study or check out this short overview summarizing Grant Thornton’s success. The full case study is available exclusively to APQC members, but the overview is available to everyone.