What is a Knowledge-Sharing Culture and How Can This Help Organisations?

In today’s dynamic business landscape, there are probably thousands of new companies and organisations that have come to life. The number of new companies probably grew more during the pandemic as there was a surge of entrepreneurial ventures. With the strong presence of the internet and social media in these modern and virtual times, we may catch ourselves focusing solely on getting sales, positioning our brand, getting our message across, and establishing authority.

Now, don’t get me wrong, these things largely contribute to an organisation’s success. However, there’s this one vital aspect for long-term success that not many companies possess: a knowledge-sharing culture within the organisation.

I am unsure in some other countries and culture, but here in the Philippines, as someone who was born here and had done some work and internships in the country, especially in large companies, I can definitely say that fostering a knowledge-sharing culture is at the bottom of the priority list of some of these organisations.

Just last year, I am grateful enough to have gotten the job title “Knowledge Manager”. I’d be lying if I said I immediately knew what I was supposed to do. I was like “What is this?” and “What should I be doing in the organisation?”. Again, here in the Philippines, we don’t have that job and title. Perhaps, not so prevalent.

Knowledge Management and Its Role in a Knowledge-Sharing Culture

I have read articles and did my research on knowledge management as the Knowledge Manager. Two points from my research that stuck with me are, as a Knowledge Manager, I am responsible for “identifying, capturing, organising, storing, and sharing knowledge within the company” and “involves the creation of an environment that promotes knowledge sharing and collaboration”.

I was like, “oh there’s such a thing!”

As a former Technical Writer and Documentation Specialist, I thought, I do have existing strategies from identifying knowledge to storing it. However, the process ends there. You get information, you organise it, you give them a link to that information, and that’s basically it. You hope for the best that your audience will make use of it. And let’s not make a fool of ourselves and actually admit that 98% of the time, they don’t, and they won’t.

Now this is where Knowledge Management comes in. As I was slowly getting a grasp of it, I realised what I didn’t have is a strategy for sharing knowledge that goes beyond giving them the link and saying “Hey there’s a new article/process here. Read it!” and actually creating a space for collaboration. A space where the people in the organisation will share a piece of their expertise, their mistakes, their lessons learned, and their ideas with others.

Knowledge-Sharing Culture and How It Contributes to Long-Term Success

In our organisation’s book club, we are currently reading Simon Sinek’s Leaders Eat Last. In it, Simon discussed how the Post-it notes got invented and it’s because of a knowledge-sharing culture.

In 3M, a manufacturing company, where Post-it notes came to life and where it is produced yearly, they value culture. It’s even said on their website that they encourage their employees to “form a special interest group around a fresh idea” and not just that but, they also “share and combine our knowledge through mentorship and storytelling.”

Silver Spencer, a scientist at 3M, accidentally created an adhesive with weak sticking power instead of a strong one for aerospace applications. Over the years, Spencer had shared this project - what people would call a “failure” and “mistake” - with his colleagues at 3M, because again, that’s what their culture is.

Instead of seeing it as a failure and just throwing the idea away, Art Fry, Spencer’s colleague at 3M who was frustrated with paper bookmarks slipping out of books, got the inspiration and applied it to paper. Now we have the famous Post-It Notes.

If it weren’t for this culture, we wouldn’t have sticky notes on our notebooks, on our bulletin boards, and even on our laptop screens. The Post-It Notes invention is an example of how a knowledge-sharing culture contributes to an organisation’s success. When we share our expertise, ideas, and mistakes without fear and when others are exposed to them without judgment, we become innovative, and we will discover new avenues for growth.

The Challenges of a Creating a Knowledge-Sharing Culture

You know, it’s easy to just put content out there and provide for the many, but it’s never a piece of cake to get them to engage, let alone trigger an exchange of ideas.

After learning what Knowledge Management is, with the help of my amazing colleagues, we have developed several initiatives in our organisation to encourage a place of collaboration. To name a few, we have an internal book club, we have a virtual watercooler chat, we have a knowledge-sharing Teams Channel, we just launched our corporate academy, and we’re now implementing an internal forum.

With these initiatives at hand, I have come up with a list of challenges in creating a knowledge-sharing culture that we’ve stumbled upon the way: ?

1.????Not comfortable enough to share.

Staff members of an organisation may feel hesitant in sharing knowledge and exchanging ideas with their colleagues. This may be due to the lack of trust in the organisation’s culture, it could be their fear of judgment, or it could also be the potential consequences of sharing ideas openly and would prefer to keep their expertise to themselves.

What we’re doing to address this:

We can never tell people to trust us. So, instead of telling them, we do it by action. We create an open and supportive environment within the organisation. Our leaders continuously share their future plans, the organisation’s state, mistakes, achievements, and struggles at the moment. ?

Transparency is key to building trust. Because important information has been shared with them, it will feel like there is nothing to hide, and if they know that there is nothing to hide, they will understand that it is a safe space for them to share their knowledge and struggles, too.

2.????Finding a balance between knowledge sharing and daily responsibilities.

This revolves around staff members finding the time to engage in knowledge-sharing activities, which really require time and effort by the way, while fulfilling their day-to-day duties. If they are already busy with their daily tasks, these activities can feel like an added burden to them, and when they feel like this, they will never participate.

What we’re doing to address this:

Understanding that not all staff members will be present and available is an important part of creating a knowledge-sharing culture. Honestly, it could be discouraging when none of them are participating in the activities and valuing the knowledge that has been shared.

But then again, they have work duties and responsibilities. The win-win situation is integrating the knowledge-sharing culture in everyone’s regular workflow. Having two accessible knowledge-sharing platforms in the organisation – a knowledge-sharing Teams Channel and a SharePoint site as a centralised hub for all information and knowledge - has been helping us treat knowledge-sharing as an essential aspect of how work should be done.

3.????Resistance to change

In creating a knowledge-sharing culture, new processes and tools will of course, need to be implemented and they will have to spend time learning it and applying the processes to reap the benefits of collaboration. Staff members may resist to these changes for reasons like fear of the unknown, disruption of their work routine and schedule, and skepticism of the benefits of knowledge-sharing activities.

What we’re doing to address this:

Implementing a knowledge-sharing culture is a two-way street. Involving the staff members in the decision-making process is a crucial step for a smooth transition. Informing them of the process, communicating the importance and benefits of a knowledge-sharing culture, and getting their thoughts using survey forms are some of the practices we implemented.

The list above is the general challenges any organisation can face in the middle of building a knowledge-sharing culture. The list just serves as a head start for organisations to prepare for these challenges, but remember, we will have our own unique solutions to overcome these. Because at the end of the day, each organisation’s culture is different, and we will definitely have our own ways to address challenges that suit that culture. We will know those solutions when we know our people.

It’s Always a Work in Progress

Building a knowledge-sharing culture is a journey. As long as the company lives, it continues. It evolves and improves with time and experience. Embracing this journey means understanding that it is not perfect, and it will never be. There will be ups and downs, trials and errors, and of course, there will be successes, too. Organisations must hold on tight and know that every idea we share, every expertise we utilise, and every lesson we learn counts that enrich our collective knowledge and strengthens an organisation’s knowledge assets.

Final Words…

While it’s crucial to prioritise our sales, operations, services, etc., we also shouldn’t overlook the most valuable resource: our staff members. Invest in them and their expertise. The dynamic of an organisation changes when they feel empowered, supported, and appreciated. Ideas will flow freely, innovation starts to rise, and knowledge sharing will be second nature to all, thus propelling the organisation toward success.?