Fluor Amsterdam office hosted their first
Knowledge Café with the inspirational Claus-Peter Haelsig, Vice President
Process & Technology facilitated the workshop and inspired and motivated
the participants. Approximately 20 Fluor employees attended; from recent
graduates to managers who they could share their thoughts and drinks within the
context of the Knowvember event.
But what is a Knowledge Café?
"A Knowledge Café is a type of business meeting or
organizational workshop which aims to provide an open and creative
conversation on a topic of mutual interest to surface their collective
knowledge, share ideas and insights, and gain a deeper understanding of the subject
and the issues involved." [1]
To start the event Claus-Peter gave an introduction about
professional connections and networking. He made excellent points about the
evolution of connections / networking in the last year(s) and their importance
in our professional career. The introduction was followed by a value creation
topic presented by Marc van Heyningen, General Manager of Amsterdam office. He
spoke about how a single innovative idea can provide a great value for both our
Clients and Fluor’s organization. He shared with participants a “cardboard”
glasses that you can slide your phone in, enabling you to navigate the model of
a compressor in virtual reality. It is a very simple idea, but proves to be
very powerful.
Then Claus-Peter
started the dynamics of the Knowledge Café. Participants were divided into
groups of 4 people seated around tables and each table had paper tablecloths
where participants could scribble their thoughts and ideas on. Before the first
question a short video was played: Business networking (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7j1nHdURKgE) then the first question was set up “What is
networking and what is it not?”and the period of sharing ideas, collective
knowledge and interactive discussions was initiated. After 20 minutes of
conversation, people from each table had a few minutes to share interesting
ideas and questions about the subject.
Upon completing the
first round of conversations, 2 people from each table rotated to another
table, in order to build on and help deepen the exploration about networking in
Fluor. After that Claus-Peter posed the second question “How do we currently
network within Fluor?”. The last question: “What will networking look like in
the Future?” but before that a short video was played: Future of Engineering (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQOGBPYf2Mg)
During the workshop this technique of facilitated
knowledge-sharing, offered individuals the opportunity to interact on a face to
face level and share their interesting ideas and insights. Here are some of the
discussions and also leave you something to think about:
• What is networking?
- A way to connect.
- Connect with people with mutual and future
interest for you.
- Long-term relation.
• What is not networking?
- “Shotgun” approach eg: LinkedIn
- Talking without
listening.
- Being in isolation.
- Not everyone you know
is in your network.
• Learn by sharing
This concept allows
people to learn more effectively through working together, interactive
conversation and asking questions, so the learner can understand the reasons
behind someone else’s actions, making it easier to adapt what’s learned to a
new situation or task.
• Networking at Fluor
In order to enhance
the networking within the company, Fluor has created an innovate tool called #CoffeeConnections which is an informal meeting with no agenda
or theme with a randomly selected person to enable to make new contacts with
other employees in different departments than their own. This provides insight
into a different part of the Fluor world and a valuable contact if required.
• More events and diversity to suit
different people
Fluor has several
networking programs to enhance the ability to promote diversity and networking
in the organization, such as: Mentoring Circles Program, Growing Representation
& Opportunity for Women Group (GROW), Graduates Advancing to
Professionalism (GAP) and Emerging Leaders Group (ELG). For more information: http://www.fluor.com/sustainability/diversity_inclusion/pages/incorporating-diversity-inclusion.aspx
• Better connectivity with offices on the
other continents
During work sharing
on joint venture projects a better connectivity allows operations 24 hours a
day, faster response, maintaining constant communication, faster squadcheck,
etc. Fluor has migrated to Coreworx, part of the MasterPlant® by Fluor project
automation suite, to expedite communication and support collaboration
regardless of the team member's locations worldwide.
• Concern of loss of knowledge with expert’s retirements
Estimates suggest
that the companies in the Fortune 500 still lose a combined $31.5 billion per
year from employees failing to share knowledge. To combat this problem Fluor
has invested in a knowledge management system, Knowledge OnLineSM, to promote collaboration and to provide a
systematic way to capture, share and reuse the company's knowledge to solve the
most complex project challenges. http://www.fluor.com/about_fluor/corporate_information/technologies/fluor-knowledge-online?tag=tabs-3&segment=2&bsl=Engineering.
• Look at new technology and it benefits for EPC companies
Recognizing the
potential benefits of utilizing drones for project execution, Fluor piloted a
drone program to use drones to track progress and conduct site surveys on the
job site, to generate aerial photography, lay-down area monitoring and
planning, autonomous capture/verification of material inventory, etc.
The Knowledge Café was extremely well received. There
were no dominant actors, just equals listening and talking about the topics and
with an open and relaxed atmosphere. People from different positions and levels
in the organization were able to share their ideas and insights in this
setting. A definite do again for next year!
Below you will find
some good feedback:
“I especially liked the opportunity for
younger people to speak up and express their views and thoughts”
“Excellent workshop, open session,
communication fluid and interesting topics”
“Diverse group: varying backgrounds,
experience, open and lively discussions”
“The event is less about the debate and
more about the conversation… and engage the audience in the discussion
rather than have them sit passively listening.”
Special
acknowledgement to Alwin Vas, Kasia Krugla and Dennis Jonker for their fine
work in organizing the logistics for the Knowledge Café.
Reference
