Just of late I've encountered a number of capability maturity models aimed at knowledge management. Capability maturity models have been around for a while in other disciplines, most notably in software development projects. Almost all of the models owe their origins to the collaboration between the US Department of Defense and the Software Engineering Institute of Carnegie Mellon University. The Capability Maturity Model was originally a tool to assess processes - in particular the processes of a contracted third party. In that sense its intent was to reduce risk.

Capability models now abound and even have been internationally standardised as part of ISO 15504 . ISO 15504 sets six levels of capability maturity as follows:

• Level 5 - Optimising Process,


• Level 4 - Predictable Process, 


• Level 3 - Established Process,


• Level 2 - Managed Process, 


• Level 1 - Performed Process, and


• Level 0 - Incomplete Process. 

Notice anything here? It's all about process. Putting aside definitional issues, last time I looked knowledge management was about people, process, technology, and content. Capability maturity models are about process, so it begs the question "Does knowledge management really need a maturity model"?

On the 26th of May I will be the guest lecturer on a management course at the Australian National University . I'm supposed to be talking about risk management and networks. Now part of the required reading for the students, which I thought I'd better read, was an article by Mickey Butts, Rebecca Wayland, and Lawrence Wilkinson called "Navigating the new realities of risk". The article was published by the Global Business Network and is very interesting in its own right. But the thing that really caught by attention was the STEEP framework, because I could immediately see it has utility as a knowledge management framework.

Now we're all familiar with the people, process and technology mantra, however I've always thought it lacked something. STEEP is an acronym for social, technological, economical, environmental, and political, which as a knowledge management framework I quite like. I think as a diagram it would look something like the picture below, noting it's a bit raw and unsophisticated.