James Kochan, Managing Director

Vitesse Solutions, LLC

Knowledge Management Design and Implementation

Jim is the founder and owner of Vitesse Solutions and he has created a highly successful approach to  Knowledge Management consulting.  His understanding of Knowledge Management concepts and the surrounding change management and technology issues is among the deepest and most comprehensive in the world.  He has pioneered and led some of the most successful and wide ranging organizational KM implementations in industry.  In 1991, he co-founded, designed and built the now well-known Ernst & Young Center for Business Knowledge (CBK) and during his tenure pioneered many key KM concepts that eventually became common practice within KM circles.  Jim has documented innovative concepts within areas such as: building communities of practice; developing mass specialized repositories with complex taxonomical structures; developing and deploying technical standards into an environment wrought with conflicts; and blending the KM strategy into the organization's business model.  Jim has pioneered solutions within these areas, authoring and rewriting much of the methods to success that are used today.

Today, Jim is a global thought leader within KM, most recently developing world class KM operations within the oil & gas industry.  He led the design, implementation and operation of the world class ConocoPhillips corporate KM process, built around collaborative communities. It is now considered the most successful KM process in the industry and is benchmarked by many organizations from many industries. This success has led to a partnership of major oil companies (operated by Agip KCO) to ask Jim to design & build the KM process for that partnership, which is considered the largest construction project in the world. His focus on measuring business impact and use off innovative tools & approaches to measuring maturity and value has proven to be highly beneficial for organizations seeking maximum value through knowledge management processes. He is a regular speaker and lecturer on KM processes.

Previously, Jim built and led the E&Y European Center for Business Knowledge in Paris, France to duplicate in Europe the successes he'd built in the United States.  He has achieved similar success at PricewaterhouseCoopers (London), Fujitsu Corporation (Dallas) and Deloitte & Touche (Washington, DC and Cleveland).  While he was building and managing large, global KM structures within these firms, Jim also provided KM consulting services to several well-known organizations in the US and in Europe.  They include:  BMW (Germany), Shell Oil (US and UK), British Petroleum (UK), Ford Motor Corporations (US and UK),  Michelin (France), Eli Lilly (Germany), and Hewlett Packard (US).  He has also spoken and lectured widely on the subject of Knowledge Management in both the US and Europe and is noted for his "real world" approach to this often too academic and misunderstood subject.

After short stint as a production manager, Jim began his consulting career at E&Y as a business strategist in 1983 and maintained similar strategy roles until he pioneered the firm's Knowledge Management process in 1991.  During his career he has worked extensively in North America and Europe, dealing with multiple cultures.

Specialized Skills and Experiences

► Global and Corporate Knowledge Process Strategy

► Project Manager and Global Implementation

► Networking & Communities Development

► Change & Cultural Development Management

► Knowledge Center Development  

► Technical Standards Infrastructure Strategy 

► Internal Marketing & Communications and Training

► KM Resources Recruiting  

Author

► Tapping the Power of Organizational Knowledge

► KM as a Competitive Advantage  

► Internal Knowledge Sharing Systems: 5 Reasons why they Fail

Contact Information

Jim Kochan

Vitesse Solutions, LLC

Telephone: (216) 524-1726

e-mail: info@vitso.com