How Knowledge sharing works in Knowledge Management

There are numerous digital and manual tools that can be used to promote knowledge sharing. The most important tool for organisations, however, is the social intranet. It is important to emphasise that such platforms support not only the exchange of knowledge among participants but also the integration and management of knowledge databases, making social intranets ideal knowledge hubs. Social intranets offer a variety of features that help promote knowledge sharing:

• Chats and private messages: Knowledge can be passed directly from one person to another. Participants can ask one another questions on specific knowledge topics and thus learn from each other. It is advisable for participants to state directly in their profile the topics in which they are particularly knowledgeable. In this way, not only is knowledge sharing within knowledge management promoted, but cooperative work among those in your organisation is strengthened.
• Documents: A social intranet allows knowledge to be uploaded in the form of documents. These documents can take many forms. They may be classic office formats such as written documents, presentations or spreadsheets, but also PDFs, images or videos. These are uploaded to the social intranet’s knowledge database and can be viewed by everyone. Users can learn from the stored knowledge at any time and from anywhere. It is also possible to edit these documents directly on the platform – even simultaneously by several people.
• Groups: Users can also organise themselves into groups within social intranets. These may be selected according to personal interests or preferences, but also according to membership in a particular department within the organisation. Such groups not only have their own internal collection of files but also their own group-specific chat room. This makes it possible to promote knowledge transmission focused on a particular topic. As only people who are either knowledgeable in the subject or particularly interested in it gather in a group, an intensive learning experience can be fostered.

The tools offered by a social intranet create numerous advantages for those involved in your organisation. This is reflected as follows:

• Improved collaboration: With communication tools such as chats, private messages or joint document editing, users can exchange knowledge with one another while generating it. Not only do they learn from each other, but they also cooperate. This can take place across departments, allowing people who would normally never cross paths to be involved in a task. This helps the organisation grow together, and advantages arise for future cooperative work, as people will already have become acquainted through their participation in knowledge sharing.
• Innovation: Knowledge sharing within the social intranet fosters innovative behaviour within your organisation. Through the sharing and provision of knowledge on the platform, participants also learn about topics outside their own field. Based on their own knowledge combined with what they have newly learned, new ideas and innovations emerge that advance your organisation.
• Decision-making: Decision-making processes are complex. Sometimes it takes a long time to reach a decision because not all parties are fully informed. This can be prevented through knowledge sharing. The knowledge collection contains information on all areas of your organisation, including knowledge important for specific decisions. This gives participants the opportunity to familiarise themselves thoroughly before making a major decision. As a result, decisions become easier and the process shorter.

The German Society for Quality (DGQ) is the leading organisation for the promotion of excellence. DGQ has more than 6,500 members, more than 5,000 of whom are registered on the organisation’s internal platform “DGQplus”. A special feature of this platform is its extensive media library. It contains over 160 hours of video and audio material, around 200 presentations and publications, and topic-related links to over 900 blog posts.

In addition, this media library contains an internal wiki with 50 topic pages and around 150 subtopics. In this way, DGQ has established a central knowledge hub on the platform, which serves not only as a first port of call for new knowledge but has also attracted new members. When the full potential of a social intranet is used, any organisation can contribute to knowledge sharing in this way.

Knowledge can be generated by one person and recorded in a document, but its full potential only unfolds when this knowledge is shared with others. And for this exchange, the right tools should be used. With the help of a social intranet or a comparable platform, this can be successfully put into practice, with long-term positive effects for your organisation.