Knowledge management systems.
Knowledge management (KM) inside an organisation is essential for ensuring that employees spend less time looking for what they need, and more time working with the people they need. The more interactive employees are with knowledge assets, the stronger the value achieved.
At Content Formula, our experienced team of KM consultants and developers design, build and deploy bespoke knowledge management systems and applications that are tailored to the individual needs and goals of an organisation.
Knowledge management refers to the practice of managing knowledge resources to facilitate the: capture, storage, access, findability, dissemination and usage of knowledge, information and intellectual capital.
It is a wide-ranging discipline that incorporates methodologies, activities and tactics in related areas such as collaboration, search, taxonomy management, information management, research, AI, community management, innovation and more.
Defining KM is often a subject for robust debate, however, it is often considered to involve the successful coming together of three main areas – People, Process and Technology:
People. This involves contributing and sharing knowledge, both explicit (written down or captured on video) but also tacit (generally locked in someone’s heads), as well as contributing to successful knowledge transfer from person to person.
Process. This incorporates processes involving the capture, review, and re-use of knowledge, ideally integrated into existing wider organisational processes.
Technology. This includes the technology that enables the capture, storage, management, search and access to organisational knowledge.
Knowledge management not only enables easy access to shared ideas, experiences, and up-to-date information, it also provides employees with the resources they need to think outside the box, foster innovation and adapt their organisation to better address evolving business needs.
Knowledge management allows businesses to remain competitive. By sharing experience and information, businesses become more flexible and intelligent, and better prepared to identify issues and develop new processes for future growth.
The business benefits of KM are potentially huge and include:
Improve efficiency
Knowledge Management is designed to improve efficiency by reducing the amount of time wasted on searching for information.
It can empower your employees by helping them find the right info at the right time through the use of enterprise search and use of AI through deployment of taxonomies and metadata.
Improve performance
Knowledge management can help support and standardise various different knowledge-related processes throughout an organisation.
It can also provide visibility of knowledge gaps within an organisation, therefore informing opportunities to improve performance and design effective training programmes.
Save time and money
Knowledge management saves time, money, and effort, by reducing the time spend searching for knowledge and information.
When repeatable processes are packaged into standard operating procedure (SOP), it enables employees to reuse assets such as reports, frameworks, research and more.
Enhance client services
When support staff can access relevant information quickly, they can serve clients much faster and efficiently. This leads to greater client satisfaction and loyalty.
KM insights can also be used to inform future client projects, using the recorded lessons learned previously to provide a faster and more efficient turn-around.
Empower decision-making
Rich knowledge assets have the capability to deliver insight and empower your company to make timely and informed decisions, giving you a competitive advantage.
By capturing and codifying knowledge assets, they can also be used for future learning opportunities, development and training.
Find out how knowledge management can benefit your business.
Request a call back with one of our KM experts, for a free consultation about your business.
Content management system
A content management system to store and publish information and assets, with appropriate templates to help publishers.
Workflows
Content management processes such as approval workflow and author reviews to support the knowledge lifecycle.
Enterprise search
A powerful search with appropriate filtering to help users find what they need.
Data tagging
Metadata and tagging to support content management processes and findability.
Employee profiles
People profiles to detail expertise, although this may be integrated from another system.
Thematic hub
The ability to create curated views of content into thematic hubs.
Access controls
Permission controls to restrict access to content down to the item, page or document level.
Collaboration tools
Social and collaborative features to encourage knowledge sharing.
Analytics and reporting
Advanced analytics and reporting capabilities.
System integration
Integration with other systems such as the intranet, and processes such as project management to support knowledge capture.
At Content Formula, we are experts at building robust enterprise search functionality with integrations across different systems to support organisation-wide findability as well as KM.
Artificial intelligence (AI)
We help you to leverage Cognitive Services in AI, the Power Platform and tools like Microsoft Viva Topics to create an intelligent KM system
Dashboard
A home page to surface new or valuable knowledge items.
At Content Formula we help you harness the power of knowledge management with the right solutions that suit your business needs. Our tried and tested agile methodology ensures that we completely understand your business environment and objectives before designing and deploying the right solution.
We provide a flexible approach to meet your individual business requirement. Whether you have only one IT resource or a fully functional IT team, Content Formula’ managed service offering can tailor an approach to suit your business.
Discovery and strategy
Discovery
KM can be complex. We undertake the necessary discovery through user and stakeholder research to uncover knowledge needs and processes across different groups; this enable you to articulate your strategy and gather requirements for solution design. A discovery phase might also involve an accompanying audit of knowledge assets.
Strategy
Behind every successful KM initiative is a robust strategy that considers high level objectives, as well as the details relating to people, process and technology. We can work with you to help you articulate your KM strategy, with an accompanying roadmap to make things happen.
KM design and build
Design and prototyping
We will work with you to scope and design an effective KM system. Frequently we also prototype a solution and then iterate the design with user groups to optimise and improve the final output.
Build and deploy
Our experienced consultants and development team will work to build and deploy a KM solution, mainly using Microsoft technologies such as SharePoint Online, Power Platform, Microsoft Viva, Azure, Microsoft Teams and tools from the Microsoft 365 platform. The solution can involve advanced techniques such as AI or social aspects to deliver even better KM.
Knowledge migration and taxonomy
Discovery
KM can be complex. We undertake the necessary discovery through user and stakeholder research to uncover knowledge needs and processes across different groups; this enable you to articulate your strategy and gather requirements for solution design. A discovery phase might also involve an accompanying audit of knowledge assets.
Strategy
Behind every successful KM initiative is a robust strategy that considers high level objectives, as well as the details relating to people, process and technology. We can work with you to help you articulate your KM strategy, with an accompanying roadmap to make things happen.
Implementation and change management
Implementation
We help you implement automation, often on an ongoing basis to support continuous improvement. Our role can differ, we can either complete the technical configuration and development, or work with your IT function as technical advisors to support your inhouse operations.
Change management
Sometimes KM can be more about changing behaviours and mindset rather than technology. We can work with you to help with change management, training and communications to help you better execute KM across your organisation.
With market-leading expertise in Microsoft 365 and Azure, Content Formula can provide Microsoft stack knowledge management solutions to suit all your business needs.
Whether you’re looking to leverage Cognitive Services in AI, with tools like Power platform and Microsoft Viva Topics, or want powerful and intuitive enterprise search functionality through SharePoint Syntex, we’ll help you succeed.
There are lots of opportunities to leverage Microsoft tools (including those in Microsoft 365) to support KM including:
Power Platform to create knowledge apps, workflows, reports and more, which will be critical in any KM environment
SharePoint to build a knowledge management system
Azure to leverage services such as Cognitive Services as well as host a KM system
SharePoint Syntex that leverages AI for smart content and document-related processes
Microsoft Viva Topics that mixes AI and curation to create themed hubs based on different topics with relevant knowledge, content and experts
Microsoft Teams as a vehicle to deliver various different knowledge-related apps and content, including Viva Topics
Microsoft Search, SharePoint Search and Azure Cognitive Search to build highly effective search experiences to ensure people can find what they need
Microsoft Graph, to help deliver a more effective, personalised search.
