Welcome to the Knowledge Cafe: Knowledge Sharing Practices for All

A place to share, talk, and be inspired by some knowledge sharing practices, tools and ideas! Join in!

Cafes are familiar places to many of us. Because cafes suggest family, nourishment, informality and community, we named our online knowledge sharing space "The Knowledge Cafe: Knowledge Sharing Practices for All."

Like Grandma's secret recipe, knowledge sharing is composed of both describable practices as well as our instincts and experiences.The Knowledge Cafe provides practices and tools, plus a place to share our instincts and experiences relating to those practices. Many wonderful existing knowledge sharing toolkits are our inspiration and the source of many of the methods. While we don't want to reinvent the wheel, we do want to gather some of our favorite methods in one place. More importantly, we want to share our stories and our tips for USING these methods.

How is the Cafe Organized?

Because knowledge sharing can be approached from different perspectives, we have organized the Cafe for flexible use. Each method, tool or process is assigned a page. Each of these pages is tagged with labels which can be used to search for particular sets of resources. You can explore knowledge sharing from the CCASS perspective, from a task perspective, or from a keyword perspective. All these search options are available on the Cafe Index page!

Since this is a new effort, we are eager for feedback on what is useful, what is missing and what could be improved. Click the discussion tab above to leave us a message!

Why and How Do I Use the Cafe?

Use the cafe to:

• Why: Discover new knowledge sharing tools and methods. How: Browse any of the links in the left navigation bar.
• Why: Search for a particular method based on a task or phase of the CCASS cycle. How: See search options on the Cafe Index.
• Why: Add a method or tool. How: First, copy the method/tool template. Then, click "New Page" in the upper left-hand corner of any page, paste in the template and fill it in. You can add new sections and/or leave others blank. Note: In order to edit or add text, you must first register for a free account. No account is needed in order to browse the site.

How Do I Contribute to the Cafe?

Read How To Wiki for an introduction. Then you can:

• add your new method or tools
• add a story of use to any of the existing methods
• list yourself if you have used a method on that method page so others can use you as a resource
• edit and improve any page here in the Cafe

What is Knowledge Sharing at CARE All About?

More CARE Knowledge Sharing Links

• Knowledge Sharing Position Paper - (.pdf - 54KB)
• Interactive tool kit to support knowledge sharing (Developed by CARE El Salvador - Spanish)Download 12 MB | Run it from this site
• CARE Knowledge Sharing Approach
• CARE Knowledge Sharing Assessment (.pdf 253 kb) This document is available only to CARE staff. The password was sent in the initial all-staff e-mail (November 7, 2006) announcing the knowledge sharing funds. CARE staff who need the password should contact mfort@care.org.
• Review of the Sexual & Reproductive Health Communities of Practice and Recommendations. This review summarizes efforts by the Sexual & Reproductive Health (SRH) team to promote knowledge sharing through CoPs, identifies key promoters and constraints for CoP effectiveness and makes recommendations for increased CoP effectiveness within CARE. CoP Summary (.pdf 180k) English | Spanish | CoP Report (.pdf 104k)
• CARE Assessment Summary (28kb .pdf) | English | Spanish