Safeguarding the future of your business knowledge

A consequence of the current economic climate is that businesses may need to reduce their staff levels. In addition to coping with the loss of key staff, how will businesses cope with the loss of key knowledge and what can they do to minimise any
potentially negative effects?

Here are five pointers to understand how to safeguard key knowledge within your business:

1 Consider the two different types of knowledge. Explicit knowledge represents hard knowledge (rules, processes, systems), whereas tacit knowledge concerns the softer more practical ‘know-how’ experience. A business needs both to be effective. Which types does your business rely on?

2 Recognise the difference between personal knowledge and organisational knowledge.
Personal knowledge is the knowledge held by staff within an organisation. When staff leave, so does their knowledge. Organisational knowledge resides within the firm/business and remains intact throughout staff changes. Where does the knowledge reside within your business?

3 Locate your organisational knowledge. There are five main ‘storage bins’ to consider:
i. Culture of an organisation summarises history and values
ii. Structures encode behaviour such as defining job roles
iii. Transformations are processes and procedures that embody knowledge
iv. Ecology represents the physical setting of the organisation which helps shape behaviours
v. External archives and data storage retain records of activities and solutions

4 Share knowledge. This reduces the risk of potential loss. Job sharing, shadowing, mentoring
and cross-functional groups of mixed discipline staff are all good strategies to ensure that a blend of both explicit and tacit knowledge are distributed and retained safely within a business.

5 Identify your intellectual capital. One of the main assets of a business will be its intellectual capital, and so it’s important to retain and protect it during a period of change. Even though it’s a major source of competitive advantage, many businesses don’t have a clear idea of what their intellectual capital is and where it resides.

Dr Martyn Polkinghorne is Manager for the Knowledge Transfer Programmes Centre within BU’s Finance & Commercial Services.