The International Financial Institutions’ (IFIs) Community of Practice for Knowledge Management converged for their 2021 Spring Meeting that was convened by the Green Climate Fund (GCF) on 21-22 April.

Representatives from 14 organizations delved into discussions on knowledge management metrics. Metrics are a crucial element of knowledge management that can lead to boosting an organisation’s efficiency and effectiveness by establishing baseline measures, procedures for measuring, and expected outcomes.

Led by the facilitators, George Zedginidze, GCF Head of Knowledge and Change Management and Professor Kimiz Dalkir, McGill University Director of the School of Information Studies, the participants learned about measurement methods used by organisations and shared experiences on innovative knowledge management practices, as well as on the current focus on measuring explicit knowledge and the need for a more balanced approach to measuring both tacit and explicit knowledge.

Ten main metrics were explored, five respectively for explicit knowledge and tacit knowledge. Knowledge management impact, business outcomes, incentives mechanisms, internal collaboration, and external stakeholders’ satisfaction were the most relevant tacit knowledge metrics. While the main explicit knowledge metrics identified were the number of knowledge products used or re-used, time spent for searching content and content findability, reduction in time for design of new projects, best practice collection and contribution, and critical knowledge identification and management.

Furthermore, the participants developed a framework on metrics for IFIs, and unpacked those metrics by identifying enablers, barriers, and mitigative measures to support their implementation. Knowledge management can be a complex undertaking which requires multiple complementary metrics to provide a coherent and multidisciplinary approach to ensure the best use of the knowledge of IFIs.

The 14 organisations who joined the 2021 spring meeting, including GCF, are the African Development Bank, Asian Development Bank, Bank of Canada, European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, European Central Bank, FMO, Global Environment Facility, Inter-American Development Bank, IDB Invest, International Finance Corporation, International Monetary Fund, Islamic Development Bank, and World Bank.