October 22, 2024 - Human Resources - By José Marques
Introduction
Knowledge is the foundation of every organization, but not all capture and distribute it efficiently. Every single employee has his understanding of every topic and the collective experience is the value of the company.
From client data analysis results to software development procedures everyone would be more productive if it could easily tap into everyone’s know-how. Intentionally managing the scattered knowledge avoids the extra time searching for undocumented information and ending up building what has already been built.
Knowledge Management is the process of transforming and persisting every bit of information so that the knowledge is shared with the correct persons at the proper moment.
Since every department of an organization uses data and knowledge everyone can benefit from a Knowledge Management System.
It is hard to manage knowledge without realizing there are two types of knowledge:
Explicit Knowledge
This information can be transferred, coded, and stored. This category includes books, reports, databases, etc…
Tacit Knowledge
This is the knowledge based on experiences, values, capabilities, or abilities. Due to its nature, it is hard to describe, code, and access.
It is possible to transform explicit knowledge into tacit knowledge and vice versa. Actually, it already happens within every organization. The SECI model splits the knowledge into 4 dimensions that naturally flow between themselves:
Socialization
In any conversation, meeting, or coaching session Tacit Knowledge is shared between individuals.
Externalization
When someone documents an experience and/or process, to avoid explaining the same thing multiple times, it transforms Tacit Knowledge into Explicit Knowledge.
Combination
When, for example. someone looks at a report result (Explicit Knowledge) and makes conclusions based on experience (Tacit Knowledge) creating a plan for the next actions.
Internalization
A person reading company guidelines learns how the company works following the same.
A correctly built system will leverage both types of information and all the dimensions to foster an information-sharing culture improving the efficiency and efficacy of the organization.
BENEFITS OF KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT
When a Knowledge Management System is built it improves the knowledge absorption capacity of an organization creating a continuous evolution environment. With an effective Knowledge System, the organization will benefit from:
Improved Performance. Everyone has access to the information it needs without the need to “reinvent the wheel”.
Improved capability of taking educated guesses with a data-oriented approach.
An integrated knowledge capture system minimizes data loss, even if that is caused by a missing data source or a leaving employee.
Improved ability to change an employee position. The adaptability of the employee increases with the amount of knowledge he has access.
Empowerment of employees to develop themselves in an agile and incremental manner.
Improved interoperability between teams and systems.
HOW TO BUILD A KNOWLEDGE SYSTEM
Building a Knowledge System is mostly taking an introspective perspective on your company. You first need to scan the common behaviors and processes that create and benefit from data. That might be financial records from your employees and clients, to streamline payments and receivables, or support requests and resolutions, to provide better and faster support to your clients and identify possible missing or badly designed features on your product.
Once you identify your needs it is possible to start organizing the content by creating categories and choosing a tool that fits your needs. The tool should allow you to easily create, search, navigate, and cooperate (by adding reviews, comments, or editions).
Having a tool and global structure in place is time to start customizing the tool and defining the processes and taxonomy (dictionary of the terms adopted by the company). This is the moment to think about how everyone should interact with the system and find possible tasks to automate (like using AI to create a meeting summary using the transcripts). At this moment, some degree of customization, workaround, or integration with another tool might be needed.
In the next step, you should start using the solution by communicating and, if needed, training your employees. From now on be open-minded and take the employee’s feedback into account. Even if the system is built the processes might be improved to better suit the persons or will really use them.
FINAL THOUGHTS
A simple but useful Knowledge Management System is no easy task to accomplish but the benefits might outweigh that. In today’s world knowledge moves the economy and by building a knowledge management system your company will perform and adapt better. It will be easier to control and improve your operations and products by simply giving you the tools for knowing and monitoring them. Having a system of this kind will give power to your teams and help you to create new solutions and new deals faster.
As an Integration Specialist at Lynxmind, he brings extensive technical expertise in system integration and middleware technologies, providing a solid foundation in ensuring seamless connectivity across platforms. He is passionate about optimizing workflows and continually seeks innovative solutions to streamline operations and enhance the company's digital infrastructure.
