What is Knowledge Management?

Knowledge Management (KM) is the process of creating or collecting useful information, organizing it efficiently, distributing it across the business, and using it to create consistent or desired outcomes.

Knowledge management allows people across the company to benefit from everyone’s expertise by making their knowledge available in one organized space. It’s also extremely useful when onboarding new employees and training them since it provides all the information your team needs in one place.

These days it’s an invaluable tool for team collaboration and outcome-focused work. All the information that employees need to do their work is easily accessible to them in one place. So, they spend less time searching and can focus more on their core tasks. Put an end to the shoulder taps, scrolling through long email threads and useless conversations. Using a platform like Klyck.io can help you find what you need, when you need it.

Let’s understand more about the purpose and process of knowledge management, the types of knowledge that are stored, shared, the tools used, and the benefits of having a platform.

 A company will perform better the more quickly and effectively it communicates information to its employees. Knowledge management has several advantages, including: 

·      More rapid decision-making

·      Convenient access to data and information

·      Increased team collaboration and idea creation

·      Improved communication within your company

·      Better data and information quality

·      Greater protection of intellectual property 

·      Enhanced training and onboarding

Process of knowledge management

Whether it’s storing sales and marketing materials, brainstorming ideas for an upcoming project or managing internal housekeeping information – knowledge management platforms play an important role. The main objectives of knowledge management are to increase organizational effectiveness and store knowledge in a format that is simple to access. It aims to provide people with the right information at the right time. 

This is accomplished by:  

·      Storing information in a knowledge management system and organizing it in a way that adheres to your needs 

·      Sharing information with those who can benefit from it or contribute to it

·      Enhancing procedures and technology to make knowledge more easily accessible 

·      Encouraging the development of new information to support lifelong learning 

By placing information in a location that is easily available to all staff, knowledge management helps businesses eliminate information silos. It gives people a place to store the knowledge they’ve accumulated over the years, stopping a business from losing that knowledge when employees leave the organization.

Effective knowledge management implementation requires the adoption of various new processes and proactive strategies. Using platforms or tools to centralize knowledge make this adoption and collaboration easy. 

To get started, companies must identify the knowledge that is already accessible to them, recognize how to share it to create tangible benefits and plan how this will be implemented.

The complete process of knowledge management can be explained in the following six steps.

#1 – Discovering knowledge

Every business has a variety of knowledge sources, including its workforce, data, and records. 

Examples could include the knowledge and skill sets that employees bring to the workplace, including experience and specialized knowledge they gain from day-to-day work. Knowledge can also be in the form of data sets from various sources including your CRM, sales metrics or industry reports, with the right analysis of this data, you can have a positive impact on your team’s trajectory. 

Organizations must recognize all the knowledge sources that are accessible during the discovery phase, placing a special emphasis on data that can be lost easily. 

A thorough understanding of the locations and patterns of knowledge transfer within the organization helps to streamline this process and understand what to collect.

#2 – Gathering knowledge

Gathering all available data and information lays the foundation for your knowledge management system and the groundwork for future processes. What documents, information, processes, data sets are important to you or your team?

Don’t overlook step #1, decisions are often made without a full understanding of the company and its capabilities as a result of haphazard or improper knowledge collection. 

Businesses must collect the information of their current team expertise, records, and external resources. A variety of tools and methods, such as automated questionnaires, personal interviews, CRM data, are available to assist.

The other benefit of knowledge management platforms is the ability to make notes during meetings or discussions. Most platforms, including Klyck.io, contain note-taking capabilities that allow you to record and organize notes during meetings.  This data can then be added to a public page to make it available to everyone else.

#3 – Analyzing the knowledge

The information gathered in the first two steps must now be thoroughly analyzed in order to categorize it properly. Data must be analyzed and put into a searchable, organized format for easy access. 

It is crucial to analyze the gathered information to ensure it is precise, valuable, and current.

#4 – Distributing the knowledge

In this phase, procedures for knowledge sharing are widely spread throughout the organization. Depending on the company’s culture, information distribution rates will change. Businesses that promote and incentivize this behavior will undoubtedly have an advantage over rivals in their sector. Using a knowledge management platform can lay out your most important information in an easy format and provide access to the right people to foster collaboration.

#5 – Using the knowledge

Organizations start to benefit from knowledge management at this stage. The process doesn’t end with finding and storing institutional knowledge, it begins with utilizing and sharing it. 

When employees apply newly acquired knowledge to their work, it boosts performance, precision, decision-making, and innovation. Sales teams have the right information at the right time to perfect calls or meetings, marketing teams know where to find what they need and customer support has the answers or best practices right at their fingertips.

#6 – Creating new knowledge

Creating and fostering new knowledge is the last step in the knowledge management process. 

It should never be viewed as a one-time process. 

A company’s performance is continually improved through knowledge management which is an ongoing process. Refreshing your knowledge platform or system and updating it with newer records, data, best practices or documentation is important. 

Organizations should continuously innovate and produce new knowledge to impart to future employees. It could be a team finding a new, more effective method of completing a job or a smarter way of acquiring information related to the company’s performance.

Any enterprise that chooses to opt for a knowledge management system does so with the intention of making use of the intrinsic goals that led to the development of this software.

Executive Efficiency

Firms are in constant search of solutions to make their organization more efficient, be it through testing new administrative measures or by applying management systems. Since information is readily available, employees do not have to spend a lot of time sifting through white papers or documents. This means faster workflow, quicker research, and accelerated returns.

Storing Knowledge for Easy Access

The most basic and the most fundamental goal of a knowledge management system is to store all knowledge gained by different individuals of a firm in a common place. This is a great asset that depends on the circulation of the right knowledge at the right time.

Upgrade Decision-Making

With faster research and more information at the tips of their fingers, organizations can make data-driven decisions. When supported by tested and proven data, there is an exponential decrease in the chances of that decision proving to be unproductive. The ability to make information-based decisions also allows different teams to work independently yet in tandem with one another, and to simultaneously track each other’s progress.

Deeper and Quality Communication

Transparent systems create clear communication links. Equal information available to all employees is conducive to trust and a feeling of mutual growth. This benefits every individual and consequently the firm as team collaboration becomes easier and members work towards the common business goals.

Customizability

Though knowledge isn’t customizable, its use and extent of sharing definitely are. A knowledge management structure ensures that an enterprise’s knowledge is shared only among those who can be trusted with it. The accessibility of every member would also vary according to their work profile and the information that they can be confidently delegated. 

Conclusion

Knowledge management has become one of the most important tools for businesses, especially for teams that require collaboration and innovation. There are various factors to be considered when planning to implement knowledge management within a company. Managers can make use of knowledge management systems to ensure that they get the most out of the data they have and create. 

For more information, check out www.klyck.io/resources