Implementing Knowledge Management: Key Planning Considerations

2. What is your content acquisition strategy?
Content is king in knowledge management. Content acquisition strategy is one of the most critical considerations in planning a successful KM initiative. A huge portion of the time and expense of a KM initiative can be attributed to the amount of content acquired for the initial rollout of the new knowledge base. In making this content assessment, organizations must answer several questions, including:

• Which content is delivering value (and which is not);
• What content gaps must be addressed; and
• What is the strategy for content retirement?

For many organizations, however, these questions present a chicken-and-egg dilemma. To decide which content to move into the new platform, organizations must already have a clear understanding of the value of its existing content. Prior to implementing a knowledge management platform, however, few organizations have a clear picture of how well existing content meets the organization’s, and customers’, needs. In fact, this lack of visibility into which content serves its purpose—and which does not—is often one of the key drivers in implementing a KM platform in the first place.

For organizations that do have effective measurement mechanisms in place, the decision as to which content to acquire is very straightforward. For those organizations that do not have a concrete measurement system in place, there are numerous content acquisition strategies to consider, including:

• Migrate all existing content into the new KM platform. Organizations that undertake this effort without having a clear understanding of the value of their content are making a huge bet. If all the content is indeed valuable and resides in one centralized repository, the organization ostensibly benefits from the consistent application of unified processes and tactics against that repository of content. However, if a significant amount of content acquired for the new platform is not useful, the company will have made a huge investment that yields minimal benefit to the organization or the end user.
• Develop all new content using the new KM platform. The benefits to this approach are that organizations can leverage improved processes for the authoring and dissemination of new knowledge. However, the process can be lengthy, and cause delays in the initial implementation of the new platform.
• Take a hybrid approach to content acquisition. This could entail a range of tactics, including using the new KM platform to point to existing content where it resides, and acquiring just a small subset of existing content for the new platform. Once metrics on relative value of existing content are collected and evaluated, organizations can make more informed decisions on future content acquisition measures, which could include updating and importing existing content, as well as developing new content. This hybrid approach can yield significant time savings during an initial rollout. In many cases, organizations can shave 75% off the cost associated with acquiring all content. However, a hybrid approach does involve evaluating content where it resides, which could require companies to integrate legacy applications to the new platform, and/or maintain those legacy applications for a longer term than initially budgeted.

3. Can you deliver the user experience your customers expect?
Forward-looking enterprises are taking a much more customer-centric approach to their KM implementation than the traditional inside-out approach of years past. To illustrate, consider a telecommunications example. Today, many telecommunications companies are comprised of four largely independent divisions, built around core offerings, such as wire line, wireless, TV and broadband. In the past, a KM initiative might have been driven and scoped based on the processes, objectives and systems of a specific division. It would not be uncommon for a customer of two of that company’s products and services to be forced to call two separate numbers, interact with two different Web self-service portals, etc.

In today’s environment, this approach is no longer tenable. Today’s Internet-savvy consumers increasingly want fast, effective service, most likely via online self-service channels, and they are increasingly willing to let the user experience dictate their buying decisions. Quite simply, they have high expectations and will take their business elsewhere if their expectations are not met.

In response to this new market dynamic, organizations need to rethink their KM initiatives. Rather than scoping these initiatives based solely on internal demands, these initiatives need to start with a unified definition of the customer experience. Customers expect to be given a consistent, quality user experience, regardless of which division their product or service belongs to. Returning to the telecommunications example, the winners will be the companies that provide a consistent, effective user experience across all product and service offerings, even when those products fall under different organizational silos.

Parting Thoughts
Your KM initiative is an ongoing journey that extends well beyond installing hardware and software, crawling existing content and enabling the authoring and publishing of content. Companies used to have a clear information advantage over their customers. Not any more. Customers are empowered, enabled and more expectant than ever. Businesses need to work harder to retain them. Implications for KM practitioners are broad, and elicit a deeper look at questions never considered much before, like "Do we need a consistent authoring process across the enterprise?" or "What does the user experience look like if there is a blend of contact touch points?"

To effectively set the stage for success in today’s economy, organizations need superior knowledge management capabilities—capabilities that enable knowledgeable, responsive agent-based support; fast, convenient Web self-service; and an effective means for accurately evaluating success in these areas. As such, KM capabilities have a very real and dynamic impact on an organization’s fortunes. Planning for and implementing a KM initiative must start with a broad, cohesive understanding of implementation strategies, content effectiveness and user experience. Organizations that can answer the three questions outlined in this article will have a much better chance of developing the KM capabilities that yield winning customer service and winning companies.