Anjo Anjewierden is getting Settled into his new position. They have an interesting arrangement for the coffee machine that enhances knowledge sharing.
All employees have a key for the coffee machine. Initially, I thought this was to prevent that students get free coffee, but it is intended to increase the social cohesion. This works as follows. Stick the key into the coffee machine, get coffee, walk back to the office and a few minutes later a colleague will bring back your key. This sheds an entirely new light on coffee machines as Knowledge Management tools.
The coffee pot and water cooler are favorite analogies for knowledge sharing in KM circles. Nice to hear that some people have actually done something with the concept.