Knowledge

Danones current networking practice emphasizes on an informal approach because the CEO
Riboud, foresees that the traditional way of knowledge management based on database
sharing does not work on Danones culture where people prefer personal interaction. This
was proved by the successful of marketplace activities in contrast to the failure of Whos
Who, which is an internal directory on Danone intranet. Thus, IT was seen as a cost at
Danone.
Access
However, the company still should consider restructure the past sharing knowledge
into a collective database to ensure that the good practices maintains even after the employees
leave the company. Second, if the company plans to go deeper, the networking practice will
extend beyond a division or even a country. A centralized intranet or other IT assisting tools
such as instant messaging, video conferencing, or file sharing will be needed to connect
Danone employees in different regions together.
Engage
Besides restructuring IT database, Danone also need a formal tracking of network
attitudes. We believe that Danone should continue conducting informal events to foster
innovative ideas and encourage peoples interaction. However, Danone also needs a system,
or statistic methods to keep track of how many and how often knowledge have been sharing
and whether the best practices shared have been adopted to impact positive change within the
company. A tangible numerical data with successful stories will bring other employees to join
this networking program.