Based on research over the past two years, I recommend that SRI begin using the SDS program to save time and money, and further that SRI enter a partnership with the Welch Company to deploy SDS among our client base. This will give SRI experience to lead the coming revolution that replaces information technology (IT) with Knowledge Management (KM). If successful, SRI's endowment will be secured for decades to come, providing a lasting legacy for SRI leadership that builds on Doug Engelbart's work that won him the National Medal of Technology this past year.
..
Synergy between market forces, SDS capabilities and SRI expertise makes timely action critical for success. Current economic conditions create demand for better management to improve earnings, which SDS accomplishes. For example, on June 23, 2001 the Defense Contract Management Agency (DCMA), which manages over $100 Billion of annual procurement for DOD, recommended consideration of SDS. This arose from an unsolicited inquiry by DCMA based solely on encountering SDS work product on the Internet. A partnership would enable SRI to meet objectives for researching KM and improving education, because SDS enhances literacy, and deployment at DCMA and other settings requires research, which SRI can accomplish, as discussed with Welch on May 17, 2001.
..
Communication Metrics is a management science for using the Schedule Diary System (SDS) software program to augment intelligence and collaboration. This occurs through a unique design to improve alphabet technology by integrating time and information. Since literacy is the engine of civilization, the SDS breakthrough aids all of the professions and all of enterprise. This fits the SRI mission to improve the nation and civilization. Intelligence is a personal characteristic for handling daily working information. Collaboration is a communication function. Taken together, intelligence and collaboration comprise Knowledge Management. Over the past 5 years or so a lot of money and effort has been expended to develop KM, but has failed, because "knowledge" and communication are difficult to understand. Since Welch has succeeded, a partnership with Welch presents an opportunity for SRI to achieve a dominate role in a new market by providing a specific solution for advancing from information technology (IT) to a culture of knowledge, explained in POIMS.
..
Therefore, SRI should seek a partnership alliance with Welch to add SRI's research capabilities for advancing KM using SDS and Com Metrics, for the following reasons....

1. SRI can improve scientific research, our core competency.
   ..
   SDS design inherently strengthens processes for scientific research of plan, perform and report. Over the past 18 months, SRI experience with Com Metrics shows that SDS works better than other methods for collaboration. Lack of collaboration causes delay, extra cost, stress and damages SRI's reputation. A government report showing time and cost savings in the range of 10:1 confirms our experience that SDS adds "intelligence" to daily work, which is effective because....
   
   ..
   
   1. SDS enables people to consistently use good management practice advocated by experts like Covey and Drucker; and
      ..
      
   2. SDS manages complexity, using chronology and organic structure, far beyond the limits of human mental biology, which is a primary aim of Doug Engelbart for meeting the challenge of growing complexity in the 21st century, as set out in the citation for Doug's award of the National Medal of Technology.

   
   ..
   Actual savings depend on deploying Com Metrics in a setting that has value at risk, i.e., complex work where the quality of management impacts results.

2. SRI experience using SDS advances Knowledge Management (KM).
   ..
   Progress has been slow at SRI and other organizations, because it is hard to design technology and work practices that move beyond information to a culture of knowledge. Many well funded projects have failed, causing sponsors to become discouraged (see letter to Welch on April 26, 2001). Even if funding were approved, it would be many years before a working prototype could be available for figuring out how to deploy useful capability. Therefore making progress requires a different strategy. SDS has a unique design that enables doing Knowledge Management everyday, all day long for anything and everything, if we wish. This gives SRI a significant advantage over other research organizations, government agencies and businesses pursuing KM. In particular, a series of specific research objectives emerge from using SDS that advance KM, which nobody else has recognized. Based on experience the past 40 years, there is no other way to gain experience doing KM other than for SRI to use SDS for Com Metrics in an appropriate setting under para 1.
   ..
   
3. SRI marketing can be aided by deploying SDS for Com Metrics.

   Our research services for computer science and management improvement can be more easily sold to clients by packaging SRI expertise with Com Metrics that enables customers to begin saving money immediately. This arrangement generates direct revenue to SRI, and provides a crucible for doing R&D on KM under para 2. SRI can benefit from market appeal of Com Metrics shown by recent inquiry from DOD. Com Metrics can benefit from SRI expertise to research and develop deployment strategies for large scale installations that require a balance between collaboration and confidentiality. SDS and Com Metrics is a powerful synthesis of technology and management science. There have been few sales so far, because new methods require enabling forces to provide visibility and to work out deployment that fosters wide scale acceptance. In addition, repeated waves of IT hype, e.g., Windows, email, Internet, have masked the true power of technology for improving management, which SDS exploits. Now that the dot com buble has burst, the need for a new kind of technology for solving information overload is made evident by falling productivity, earnings and stock prices. If SRI can enable SDS, this could launch the proverbial "killer application," by taking large market share from wordprocessing; but, more importantly, growing a much larger market for "intelligence" that converts information into knowledge. Since "intelligence" is the engine of enterprise, and since SDS is the first generation of KM that truly extends IT capabilities by several orders of magnitude, this seems like an important opportunity. Rewards would significantly enhance SRI's endowment.
   ..
   Industry trends are moving toward deployment, rather than continued efforts to invent exotic KM capabilities. Our traditional sponsors for research are giving up, because it has proven difficult to invent KM that improves upon IT. SDS has accomplished this. Therefore, SDS enables SRI to lead industry efforts for deployment, as called out by leaders at a world conference in Paris on February 23, 2001.
   ..
   While success of this initiative does not, per se, require SRI to use SDS, customers feel more comfortable pilot testing new capability to save time and money, if the organization promoting the sale demonstrates commitment and confidence through personal experience. This can be accomplished under para 1 and 2, and provides invaluable experience we need to design effective deployment for customers.
   ..
   

4. SRI can advance education, government and business.

   SDS leverages innate mental biology, commonly called "intelligence," and improves communication through analysis, alignment, organization, summary and feedback "metrics," that can help SRI improve education, since learning occurs through both intelligence and collaboration. SRI has contacts and ongoing marketing that can marshal funds to do research for transitioning education from information to a culture of knowledge. Welch has demonstrated the Internet can be converted into a strategic asset for learning that enables people to solve problems on demand, by capturing organizational memory and adding "intelligence," as defined in POIMS. The same capability that aids education and learning, necessarily improves government and business.

   
   
   

Patrick Lincoln