🧠 What is a Knowledge Management System?
In this article, we will explore the definition of a knowledge management system, its examples, benefits, essential features, and some of the best knowledge management systems available on the market. A knowledge management system is a set of policies, procedures, and tools that organizations use to implement effective knowledge management. Organizations implement knowledge management through dedicated IT-based software systems that are optimized for the capture, organization, storage, and sharing of knowledge.
📚 Types of Organizational Knowledge
There are three types of organizational knowledge: tacit knowledge, implicit knowledge, and explicit knowledge. Tacit knowledge is the knowledge that you acquire through experience, which you may not be constantly aware of, but you use it intuitively when you need to. Implicit knowledge is the knowledge that you're aware of but which is not documented. Explicit knowledge is the knowledge that you are aware of and which is documented. Organizational knowledge is a vital and valuable asset. The purpose of a knowledge management system is to ultimately safeguard this collective knowledge and create a culture of knowledge sharing that benefits employees and ultimately has a positive impact on business growth and profitability.
📝 Examples of Knowledge Management Systems
There are several examples of knowledge management systems, including:
Lessons Learned Database
A lessons learned database contains information from lessons learned during past projects and from business practices. This database may include information got from people who have tackled problems in the past, such as how to build a specific feature for a particular market. It may include defined problems or situations, actions taken, outcomes, and results. Lessons learned help people prevent from repeating mistakes that other people made in similar situations in the past.
Communities of Practice
Communities of practice are groups of individuals who discuss problems, opportunities, lessons to learn, and other information gained from users. A good knowledge management system provides these groups with a way of sharing information.
Knowledge Base
A knowledge base is a library of information about products and services. It typically includes answers to frequently asked questions, how-to guides, and troubleshooting instructions. Its purpose is to make it easy for people within and from outside the organization to find solutions to their problems without asking for help. Knowledge bases use a combination of text, image, and video-based content.
Internal Knowledge Base
An internal knowledge base is typically utilized to allow employees to collaborate and share all company knowledge and information internally. When creating an internal knowledge base, you can include anything meant for internal use. It is internal because it is intended to be used only by the employees of an organization. This system is usually accessible via an organization's intranet or employee-only website that requires a secure login.
External Knowledge Base
An external knowledge base, also known as a customer-facing knowledge base, is where customers and users can learn anything they would ever need to know about a company's products and services. It's usually accessible to everyone and can be easily found online.
Feedback Database
Feedback from actual users provides valuable insight that can help you improve your products and services. You can have a database that collects feedback from customers and employees, and that will help you improve your product and ultimately make sure that you are implementing the right roadmap for your company. The gather feedback is accessible ideally to the design department and other interested departments.
Research Database
You can use a research database to track the results of customer data collected via quantitative or qualitative research and to track data about products and services offered by competitors. A research database can help your design and marketing teams develop products that provide a great customer experience and be competitors in terms of price, features, and benefits.
🌟 Benefits of Knowledge Management Systems
Knowledge management systems offer numerous benefits for all types of organizations, including:
Retention of Organizational Knowledge
The primary benefit of knowledge management systems is that they help to maintain organizational knowledge, and as a result, know-how, relevant knowledge, and expertise are maintained inside the organization. All the other benefits are derived from this primary benefit.
Knowledge Sharing
A knowledge management system encourages team members to share knowledge with colleagues and helps to ensure that everyone is on the same page. This creates a culture of knowledge sharing and leads to improved communication and ultimately better relationships between employees, the elimination of silos between employees and departments, and the avoidance of redundant effort.
Rapid Access to Information
Knowledge management systems provide rapid access to knowledge, data, and information, often at your fingertips. Employees don't have to wait long periods of time to find this necessary information, and neither do they have to wait to find and meet colleagues who may have the necessary information as well.
Improved Employee Productivity
Without a knowledge management system, employees are forced to learn and relearn information and processes. This is a costly and inefficient practice. With a knowledge management system in place, your employees are saved from duplication of effort and can invest their time and effort in producing new knowledge and better products and services. A robust knowledge management system reduces information search time significantly and leads to an improvement in organization-wide employee productivity. In addition, access to relevant, accurate, and verified information also helps employees improve productivity.
Improved Decision Making
Knowledge management systems lead to faster and improved decision making through timely access to relevant information and experience.
Cost Reduction
Knowledge management systems help to reduce costs through a prevention of redundant effort. A powerful search feature can prevent time spent recreating existing knowledge.
Reduced Employee Turnover
Keeping employees engaged and protecting them from burnout is a huge benefit. Reduced dependence on external training programs is another one. Expert communities and knowledge bases cut down learning and development costs and reliance on third-party training programs.
Reduced Research Time
Robust knowledge management systems reduce research time dramatically.
Decrease in Employee Onboarding Time
This happens through quick access to company knowledge and self-service.
Reduced Customer Return
Satisfied customers are less likely to switch to competing products and services.
Innovation
Strong competition requires that businesses innovate continuously to develop better products and services. Knowledge management systems drive innovation through knowledge retention and sharing, knowledge creation, collaboration on new ideas, and access to expert knowledge.
🔑 Essential Features of Knowledge Management Systems
The following is a list of features that are essential for knowledge management systems:
Robust Search
One of the primary reasons for using a knowledge management system is to improve access to information, provide instant answers, and reduce the time spent searching for information. A robust search benefits all departments and employees and dramatically improves employee productivity.
Collaboration
Collaboration improves communication and leads to higher levels of motivation and engagement.
Reporting and Analytics
With reporting and analytics, you can see how the knowledge management system is performing. This will help you to make needed improvements to the system.
Customization
A knowledge management system that can be customized to your requirements is more likely to benefit your organization.
Scalability
A solution that doesn't scale will likely be discarded at some point in time. Discarding all that knowledge to then recreate it is such a painful process. So make sure to find one that's really going to work for your business in all aspects.
Integration
A standalone knowledge management system offers many benefits, but a system that supports integration with third-party systems allows users to do so much more.
Multilingual Support
If you have a global workforce, which many companies do, then your knowledge management system needs to support multiple languages and provide every visitor with a tailored experience in their native language.
Feedback
Without feedback collection, your knowledge management system is incomplete. With feedback, you get real-time input from system users. With feedback, you can make incremental improvements to the system, and these improvements will really enhance the system's benefits such as knowledge sharing, innovation, and reduction in costs.
🌟 Metrics for Measuring Knowledge Management System Effectiveness
The ability to measure the effectiveness of a knowledge management system is critical for every business. Measurement gives you insight into whether this system is being used, how the system is performing, and what is working and what needs to improve. A metric is a quantitative measure of the degree to which a system, entity, or process possesses a given attribute. Selecting and tracking the right metrics to focus on is essential to measuring the knowledge management system effectiveness. The metrics you select will depend on your business objectives.
The following is a list of important metrics to help get you started so you can really measure that effectiveness of the system that you choose to put in place:
User Feedback
One of the simplest and most effective methods of determining whether a system is used by employees is through a feedback mechanism. Feedback indicates that employees are using the knowledge management system and that they trust it sufficiently to take the time to submit feedback.
Search Engine Usage
Another metric that determines the usage of that knowledge management system is search engine usage. You can analyze search engine logs to generate reports that show usage, the number of searches performed, and details of search terms.
Contributions
The number of contributions is a strong measure of employee engagement with the knowledge management system. Identifying what's called super contributors can help you understand how to use them, these people in your company as models for increasing employee engagement. Low contributions will push you towards understanding the reasons behind low employee engagement, which will enable you to take the actions that are necessary for improving engagement.
Interactions
A high number of interactions on knowledge-based articles and posts indicate a high level of interest. If interactions are low, we can gather feedback from employees to determine why that's the case. You can then encourage employees to interact with the content that they find interesting and useful.
🤔 FAQ
What is a knowledge management system?
A knowledge management system is a set of policies, procedures, and tools that organizations use to implement effective knowledge management. Organizations implement knowledge management through dedicated IT-based software systems that are optimized for the capture, organization, storage, and sharing of knowledge.
What are the benefits of knowledge management systems?
Knowledge management systems offer numerous benefits for all types of organizations, including retention of organizational knowledge, knowledge sharing, rapid access to information, improved employee productivity, improved decision making, cost reduction, reduced employee turnover, reduced research time, decrease in employee onboarding time, reduced customer return, innovation, and increased customer satisfaction.
What are the essential features of knowledge management systems?
The essential features of knowledge management systems include robust search, collaboration, reporting and analytics, customization, scalability, integration, multilingual support, and feedback.
How can you measure the effectiveness of a knowledge management system?
The ability to measure the effectiveness of a knowledge management system is critical for every business. Measurement gives you insight into whether this system is being used, how the system is performing, and what is working and what needs to improve. The metrics you select will depend on your business objectives. Important metrics to help get you started include user feedback, search engine usage, contributions, and interactions.
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