How can you share information and best practices among program teams using knowledge management systems?

Regardless of whether you are using waterfall or agile to manage programs and projects, it is important to maintain a repository in an updated way, this helps in several aspects, from the integration of new members into the team, and at the end, during the project and program handover.

For me, Knowledge Management Systems (KMS) in program management streamlines information flow, ensuring all team members have access to the data, insights, and expertise they need. It encourages collaboration, promotes consistency, and reduces redundancy. It aids in decision making as project managers are well-informed through historic and real-time data. Risk management improves as past project pitfalls are documented, and successful solutions are catalogued for future reference. In summary, KMS adds value by improving efficiency, reducing errors, and promoting innovation.

Of course, there are different management systems for different needs, but two common ones that I highly recommend are: Confluence and Sharepoint.

Note: “Types” should be defined first to know what it’s really pertaining to. But in terms of the scale, KMS can be categorized primarily into three types: 1. Enterprise-wide systems: These are used across all departments of a company, promoting knowledge sharing and collaboration. 2. Team-based systems: Designed for specific project teams to communicate, share knowledge, and work collectively. 3. Department-based systems: These focus on a specific department's needs and processes, promoting knowledge use within a specific domain. Each KMS type is respectively designed to capture, organize, and disseminate an organization's knowledge, either across the whole entity or within certain groups or departments.

??? Utilizing an Explicit Knowledge Management System (KMS) involves several steps: 1. Capture: Document knowledge such as policies, data, or manuals. 2. Organize: Categorize and index knowledge for easy searchability. 3. Store: House knowledge in an accessible database or repository. 4. Access: Structure the system for easy navigation. 5. Disseminate: Share knowledge via emails or shared documents. 6. Update: Regularly maintain, remove obsolete information and ensure accuracy. 7. Train: Educate users on effectively using and contributing to the system. 8. Assess: Evaluate the system's usage and effectiveness for continuous improvement.

Tacit knowledge is the unspoken expertise, insights, and intuition that individuals bring to their roles. Some tips: ??GENERATE: Develop your team culture, and truly value your team's insights. ??GATHER: Use a Google form to gather weekly feedback from your team. Schedule time to review these takeaways and bring highlights to team meetings. ??MANAGE: Project management software (Trello, Teams, Slack, Confluence, Notion, ect.) has spaces to build a database which can simply be a document OR you can build a full DokuWiki When choosing a knowledge management system, it's essential to consider factors such as ease of use, integration capabilities, collaboration features, and the specific needs of your team

In the age of information overload, schedule weekly team meetings to exchange best practices. And keep adding best practices in deck (say one slide per session). Simple & the most effective approach.