Hamish was engaged by BIS to improve the interaction of academic and business alliances in order to drive innovation in business. They were primarily using a ‘body contact’ mechanism of meetings and networking events to bring people together, yet this was not yielding the level of interaction they desired. Hamish’s remit was to improve this contact by a factor of ten using a limited budget of just £4million, so he created a series of interlinked online networking forums called Knowledge Transfer Networks. Still in use now, they allow the exchange and safe storage of industry knowledge between sector specialists and promote collaboration.
To drive membership Hamish played an intrinsic part in enabling and upskilling KTN facilitators to understand the more human aspects of managing networks. This involved considerable cultural change, and Hamish’s deep understanding of knowledge management best practice in other European countries was key to this. Within a short time over 60,000 members were actively using the service, considerably more than the ten-fold increase required. The system was delivered on time and within budget, and was deemed a great success by BIS.
