Benefits Of Knowledge Management Systems In Business

The benefits of knowledge management systems in business are difficult to quantify in general and straightforward to measure at one point, which is onboarding.

A new starter’s first month is almost entirely a knowledge transfer exercise. How things are done here, who to ask, where things live, what the exceptions are. Without a system, that transfer happens by interrupting colleagues, which costs two people’s time rather than one.

Measure it once. Ask a recent starter how many times in week two they had to ask a colleague something that could have been written down, and ask the colleague how long each interruption took including getting back to what they were doing.

Multiply by your annual hires. That figure is usually enough to fund the system on its own, before any of the harder-to-measure benefits are counted.

The Fair Work Ombudsman covers employer obligations. This is general information rather than legal advice, and obligations vary by state and territory.

See Sentrient’s knowledge management system and onboarding management system.