Knowledge transfer in the company: the success factors

The basic economic resource – the means of production -is no longer capital, nor natural resources, nor labour. It is and will be knowledge.

Peter Drucker

Knowledge is the most important resource of many companies. In this article we discuss the success factors for maintaining, sharing and transferring knowledge in the company. The most important factors are that the person wants to and is able to share his or her knowledge. This can be achieved through various factors and incentives. On the other hand, the boundary conditions on the part of the company have to fit so that the people can find and exchange each other. Technical tools, databases, etc. for sharing knowledge are less important, as long as the other two factors fit.

Properties of knowledge and obstacles to sharing

Knowledge can be divided into many categories with different characteristics. But basically knowledge has the following characteristics:

• It is owned by a person or a group and consequently cannot be handed over with little effort.
• Knowledge changes and multiplies with use or is lost if it is not used.

The purpose of knowledge transfer in a group or company is to preserve knowledge or to transfer it to several people (e.g. new employees). There are various obstacles, which can be divided into the following categories:

• People must want to and be able to share knowledge.
• Boundary conditions & culture in the company: Create an environment where people can find each other and exchange (localise knowledge), interrupt routines, share knowledge: communicate and apply it together.
• Technical tools, platforms etc. where knowledge is shared

The two most important categories for me are the person himself and the boundary conditions or the culture.

The personal aspect

Let’s start with the person, the knowledge donor. For a person, there are roughly three main reasons in the company not to share their knowledge:

• Knowledge is a source of power that is not readily given away. This is often linked to the fear of not being needed afterwards. These are the employees who want to protect their knowledge and manage it for as long as possible.
• Knowledge transfer takes time. At first, the donor has nothing to gain from sharing knowledge. All that is needed is time, which may then be lacking for personal tasks / projects.
• They can’t share knowledge: no time, leave the company or it doesn’t work linguistically/culturally.

There are also some obstacles on the side of the knowledge receiver:

• The recipient of knowledge also needs time and space to receive the knowledge.
• Person does not know where the knowledge is (knowledge donor or repository of written knowledge) or that this knowledge even exists in the company
• Knowledge that has to be handed over directly because it is not written down or cannot be written down: Person does not know the knowledge donor or cannot/must not make contact – a problem of team culture.
• Various communication barriers: Recipient does not understand content, language, culture, etc.

The lifespan of knowledge varies greatly between industries and the issues and approaches to knowledge sharing differ accordingly. For example, in fast-changing industries it is less of an issue that people do not want to share their knowledge because the knowledge quickly becomes obsolete anyway. On the other hand, in these sectors it does not make sense to transfer tacit knowledge into explicit, written knowledge (database, manual, etc.) precisely because the information changes so quickly. Sometimes the benefit is less than the effort.

The success factors for knowledge transfer in the company

So what are the boundary conditions for optimal knowledge transfer and how can people be motivated and rewarded to contribute to any system?

• Create awareness for knowledge transfer among people and clearly communicate its importance for the team: From the company’s point of view, it is much more valuable if people share the information and thus multiply it than if they alone use the knowledge as efficiently as possible. In the long run, it is also advantageous for the knowledge donor to share knowledge. In the long run, this creates more time to generate new knowledge and remain important in the long run.
• Create a culture of cooperation: What you don’t give, you can’t get. Every exchange leads to new knowledge on both sides.
• Replace knowledge as a source of power. This is possible by giving the person the status of an expert. From experience, people then prefer to share their knowledge. You are the contact person, have a function in design reviews or controls and have to add your signature. This is how you strengthen your position.
• Valuing people’s contributions, because their knowledge does not automatically belong to the company – you have to value it and involve people as much as possible. This is why I also talk about a donation, because it cannot be taken for granted. This can be underlined by other benefits such as further training, stars for expert, money, etc.
• Create time and space for knowledge exchange. Initiatives and platforms to share knowledge help here.
• Make knowledge transfer, documentation of knowledge and learning (expanding knowledge) a part of daily work and routines – especially also for tools
• Deliberately interrupt established routines: “You do it the way it’s always been done”. In this task, especially new employees or external persons/consultants make a very valuable contribution, because they do not know the processes and can therefore judge and critically question them differently. Socialisation in the company has a positive effect on performance (efficiency) but a negative effect on the possible contribution to learning.

Tools for knowledge transfer

The third category concerns tools, software tools etc. for sharing knowledge. Here, too, there is a great variety of methods and tools. In my view, the form is not so decisive, as long as the above boundary conditions fit. Then a simple Word document or Excel spreadsheet will go a long way. The important thing is to store the knowledge in a known place. This does not necessarily have to be central. But if you don’t know where the knowledge is, it is difficult to search for it.

Regardless of the type of knowledge and industry, I find it very purposeful to bring people into contact with each other and let them exchange ideas. To do this, you have to find people who have the required knowledge. Here, too, there are many tools to help. Since direct exchange is a rather time-consuming method, it is particularly suitable for knowledge that quickly becomes outdated or cannot otherwise be written down. In this way, you can still ensure that you always have the latest information and can also pass on knowledge well, which only lives on through joint application. Depending on the size of the company and the frequency of the exchange, rules must be defined here on how to contact the relevant knowledge donors.

In connection with these tools, the security of the data must also be assessed. How easily can the knowledge from there be changed, deleted, copied and redistributed?

Conclusion

In this article we discussed how knowledge can be shared and passed on in the company. We have discussed the most important boundary conditions and personal aspects. These processes are important in most companies to pass on specialised knowledge about processes and products of the company. However, this does not automatically generate new knowledge and does not create a competitive advantage. At most, the company remains the same as it was before. This is not enough in most industries over a long period of time. In a next post, we will look at how existing knowledge in a company can be continuously recombined and thus become a long-term competitive advantage. In another blog post, we discuss a special case of knowledge transfer, namely when a person leaves the company (to the blog post).

evores supports you in creating the boundary conditions for knowledge transfer in your team or in planning and implementing knowledge transfer initiatives. I have many varied and creative tools in my rucksack. There is sure to be a suitable method for your team.

How well are the success factors for knowledge transfer fulfilled in your team? You can analyse these and many other essential questions for efficient and successful cooperation in diverse teams free of charge and online with the evores compass. Various team members anonymously fill out a questionnaire and you receive a lot of very valuable insights into the current state of cooperation and possible optimisation opportunities. Register your team right now for the free evores compassand experience how easy it is to make collaboration and team culture tangible.

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