At the Tinderbox Forum, an interesting post reminds is about the challenge of everyone’s everyday knowledge work.
I do economic development for a local government, and one of my primary programs consists of running a network of 25 or so resource providers (i.e., consultants) who I connect with various clients. Â The short version is: a) meet with a client and figure out where they need a hand, and b) start matching them up with consultants who can help them out with their challenges. Â I'm the matchmaker.
The IT department strictly limits the software that can be used on the government machines; the author uses Tinderbox on his personal laptop which he keeps with him all the time. (This is another reason the iPad is going to matter a lot — it’s a personal device outside the ambit of the bureaucracy.)
i also just created a map of all 162 consultant visits we made this year, grouping each individual consultant visit into various categories (i.e., 44 of the visits were in the "business planning/strategy" category; 14 were in the HR category; 16 were in the "sales/marketing" category, etc.) Â I'm putting that map up on the projector screen tomorrow during my steering committee meeting. Â Its a great visual.
I'd expect this would be terrific, too, for lots of NGO work.