Knowledge Management (KM) in organizations is based on an understanding of knowledge creation, knowledge transfer, knowledge use, knowledge flows and knowledge governance. In implementation, KM is an effort to benefit from the knowledge that resides in an organization by using it to achieve the organization’s mission and the activities of its users. The transfer of tacit or implicit knowledge to explicit and accessible formats, the connection of tacit to explicit knowledge (which is connecting your organization’s experts to explicit knowledge), and the understanding of social network analysis within the organization contributes to the effective distribution and use of knowledge. In delivering Knowledge-as-a-Service (KaaS) we must not only understand what knowledge management means for the organization, but also understand the nature of organization’s knowledge itself.

In KaaS knowledge must be Dynamic, Accurate and Personal. Let’s explore each of these characteristics:

Dynamic

Knowledge is a result of a varied set of processes and flows, which demonstrate the active nature of knowledge. The dynamic nature of knowledge stems from the fact that knowledge is active and always changing. This change is a direct result of the changing and evolving human experience at your organization. This also effects the relationships (connections) between employees and their experience that is gained through assignments, training and learning.

To manage the dynamic nature of knowledge, it must be governed and maintained. Knowledge must be constantly updated adhering to your organization’s content (information and knowledge) lifecycle management processes. This also includes the experts who can provide insights about the knowledge. It must allow for the evolution of changing experiences and connections through communities and mapping the connections of people to people, people to content and content to content. The Dynamic component of knowledge reflects your organization’s brand, tone and evolves over time.

Accurate

The Accurate component of knowledge is identified as the authoritative source and authoritative voice for that subject matter. This knowledge is accepted by your organization as the “source of truth”. The level of accuracy of knowledge determines the quality of performance of the KaaS framework in real-world situations. The use of standards in the creation, use and maintenance of knowledge will serve as a basis for consistent and accurate knowledge. The importance of standards will provide people and organizations with a basis for mutual understanding and are used as tools to facilitate communication and measurement of the quality and accuracy of the knowledge within the organization.

 KaaS will be utilized to allow users to collaborate, communicate and distribute all company knowledge and information internally (and through external channels). KaaS provides in-depth, instant, on-demand knowledge to your users. In doing so, the knowledge, including all connections and content (text, images, voice, video, etc.) must be kept up-to-date and accurate. The knowledge that is accessed must be the “source of truth” and trusted by all users.

Personal

The Personalized component of knowledge answers the questions that the users of your knowledge are seeking. Personalized knowledge is tailored to what the individual needs to make decisions and presented in a way that is tailored to the device and applications the users are leveraging to access answers to their questions. Personalized knowledge is facilitated by how knowledge flows throughout your organization. In KaaS knowledge is optimized for the benefit of the individual user. Knowledge is also mapped to enable people seeking knowledge to find people within the organization with the necessary knowledge and skills.

As knowledge within the organization grows (tacit and explicit) fast response and personalized access to organizational knowledge assets have become necessary to execute and deliver results. This is particularly important for content-related products and services, such as consulting, news, and knowledge management in an organization. The digital nature of these products allows for more customized delivery within the KaaS Framework. To provide personalized services a complete understanding of user profile and accurate associations to people and are essential.

Summary

The KaaS framework can help your firm leverage knowledge from anywhere, anytime, and by any user in a distributed computing model. To properly incorporate a KaaS framework your organization must understand what knowledge means for your organization, where it comes from, and how to use it. The main advantage of deploying a KaaS framework will not only be better management of the knowledge, but also better access to knowledge. This was a brief explanation of how knowledge is viewed and delivered within the KaaS Framework.