An Internal Knowledge Base is a centralized system where companies store essential information, procedures, and best practices. It helps employees easily access and share critical knowledge across complex processes.
Any organization’s most important asset is its information and it shouldn’t be taken for granted, right?
As your organization grows, the amount of important information keeps on increasing day by day, and storing it casually is a mistake you don’t want to make. If you are storing your information in email drives, inboxes, or temporary folders, you need to start moving away from it and start looking for ways to build an Internal Knowledge Base. It’s a centralized digital repository with all kinds of information about the organization, processes, work, etc in one central hub and serves everyone from one place.
In this guide, we’ll cover the meaning of an internal knowledge base, its examples, benefits, and a detailed guide on how to create one for your organization with a surprise suggestion towards the end. So, if you are looking to transform your organization’s internal knowledge base, keep on reading.
Imagine that you have a magic spell that answers all/any questions you have. Yes, this magic spell is your internal knowledge base where page-by-page, you can find what you need in an organized manner.
So, instead of repeatedly bothering your team leaders, HR, IT, colleagues (bothering for tea breaks don’t count :P), you can just dive into your knowledge base and find the treasure trove of information around whatever you were looking for. This will free up a lot of your, your teammates’, your manager’s, and everyone else’s time and keep them all on the same page and not get lost in the mess like them.
Also when you have everything in one place, you will notice that tasks and processes will start to move faster and in a more efficient manner coz your go-to information is always a few page flips away.
Let’s dive straight into a couple of examples of an internal knowledge base.
In the wide world of knowledge bases, different types of documentation are utilized in different forms by different teams for different use cases.
Standard Operating Procedures: A Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) outlines the ‘how-to’ of a specific task or process in an organization. In an internal knowledge base, SOPs are known to give clear and consistent instructions to everyone in the team and ensure the efficiency and accuracy of tasks at hand. It also helps in keeping all the relevant members in sync!
Training & Learning Materials: When you want your team to acquire new skills and knowledge, these are the best materials to go for. They include everything from instructional guides to tutorial videos and interactive modules. You can also give your team practice documents that can foster continuous development and build a well-informed team.
Onboarding Modules for New Hires: If you also feel that onboarding new employees is a tedious task, this is exactly what you need- structured modules! These are well-thought-out and crafted guides for newcomers starting from their initial training and orientation. This consists of detailed information about the company policies, job roles, and tools. This can ensure smooth transitions and a great kickstart in their new roles.
Popular Replies for Customer Service: These are frequently asked questions or common issues listed in one place with the correct answers to them. This is a knowledge base, your go-to scripts that are pre-written, factually correct, and accurate that help in ensuring high-quality support and reduced response time.
Step-by-step Guides: These step-by-step mother guides are part of an internal knowledge base that breaks down complex tasks and processes into simple, clear, and sequential instructions. These guides can prove to be very useful when a group of employees are working on a complex task and aiming to reduce the likelihood of errors. They can simply follow a clean roadmap and make it seamless for all team members as well as themselves to achieve desired outcomes.
Troubleshooting Manuals: These are comprehensive guides that are meant to identify and resolve commonly faced issues in any specific team or organization. These not only offer step-by-step solutions and diagnostic tips for a variety of issues but also ensure that the team is capable enough to address issues as complex as possible. Troubleshooting manually streamlines problem-solving of complex tasks, reduces downtime, and enhances overall efficiency.
Softcopy & Hardcopy Records: These records refer to all those important documents and data any organization would have - both digital and physical versions. The digital versions are stored electronically which makes it easy for all users to access while the physical versions are printed and stored regularly. Both ensure that data is preserved and accessible to all as and when needed within the organization.
Audio Video Presentations: Yes, you are thinking in the right direction. These are multimedia resources that are an amalgamation of visuals with audio to deliver maximum impact through their content. These presentations can include product demos, training sessions, instructional videos, etc which break down complex data into digestible information. These can be revisited and updated as and when needed by the organization.
Audio Tutorials: You know of those audio recordings in an internal knowledge base that consists of step-by-step instructions on various topics. These allow employees to understand information more thoroughly. These are ideal for reinforcing training, guiding processes, delivering updates, etc in an engaging manner.
Users use the information available online as knowledge bases to get the scoop on your products/services, right? Similarly, your employees need a central hub where they can go to understand the nitty-gritty of any project, assignment, service, feature, or almost anything in an organization. Internal knowledge base is like a treasure trove of information, and resources that allows all employees to self-serve the information and use their time for better and strategic tasks.
Moreover, you can choose one of these two options when deciding how to set it up for your organization. You can either go ahead with an ‘on-premise software’ where tools are directly installed to your computer hardwares and autoruns on your system. The other method to do this is using a ‘SaaS tool’ that runs on a software provider’s servers and you can use it through a browser or a mobile application.
Think of an internal knowledge base as your all-time player. This player will boost your efficiency across all verticals and projects of your business. Let’s look at how it changes the game.
You can bid adieu to wait around for answers! Your team now has 24*7*365 access to the knowledge base and can now operate with the same efficiency with/without anyone’s guidance in the team. Whatever data or information you need is now just a click away!
As they say, the smoother the onboarding, the smarter the employee. When an employee joins your organization, starting on the right foot becomes crucially important if you want a high-performing & productive employee in the interest of time. Hence, the internal knowledge base has everything they need neatly organized in one place.
Imagine when all employees find answers without repeatedly reaching out to HR & IT teams. Sounds productive, isn’t it? They can utilize that time to solve bigger problems and tackle more important issues affecting the overall organization’s growth.
Well, it’s time to bid adieu to information silos and introduce your organization to one reliable source of truth. An internal knowledge base ensures everyone is on the same boat and sailing in the same direction and is updated with the latest info.
When your employees live a productive, and efficient work life, they commit more towards making their work-life more driven. This also leads to higher satisfaction and better retention rate of employees.
If your internal knowledge is a toolbox, here’s a rundown of what you need:
Company Information: Start adding your annual reports, org charts, contact lists, and everything else that you think is needed. Anyone who goes through this will know about who does what.
HR Materials: Goodies like employee handbooks, payslips, and review forms can be a part of this deck. Any HR-related information that you need, this document will provide everything and also ensure that everyone is on the same page.
Training Materials: Your onboarding training plans, safety protocols, certification guides, etc. can be dumped in this folder. Current or new employees can get everything they need to level up their skills here.
Sales Collateral: All your case studies, sell sheets, and process guides can go here and keep your sales team armed with the latest strategies and numbers.
Documentation: Your organization’s process documents, software manuals, SOPs, and checklists, all can be here. This can be your detailed map for navigating through the company’s tools and workflows.
Marketing Collateral: This is your go-to place for everything marketing - editorial calendars, social media templates, graphic designing tips, copywriting best practices, etc. It helps in bringing your creative teams in sync and making them work on a schedule.
Media & Press Files: Your documentation of the organization’s press releases, contact lists and media images can go here.
Design Files: Your brand guidelines, creative handbooks, color codes & font, etc will ensure the brand’s visual identity is in synergy across all platforms.
Legal Documents: Your law-enforced contracts, release forms, basic/detailed policies, and all things legal can sit here in an organized, & easy-to-find manner.
Customer Service Resources: Your FAQs, tele-calling scripts, email templates, etc can be a part of this segment. This will enable your customer support team with all the tools they need to provide a high-quality service.
If this information has been packed tight in your mind, let’s move on to knowing the primary pain point of this article.
Creating an internal knowledge base isn’t a biggie, you just have to put your information in an organized manner and keep updating it from time to time. Let’s get into the detailed steps of how to start.
Before you start, think of what you want to achieve with your internal knowledge base. List down your goals whether you want to build a seamless onboarding process, a proactive ecosystem, etc and that will help you decide your next steps. For example, it will help you decide if you want to document technical processes, best practices, company policies, and whatnot! Think of this knowledge base as a whole and then list down what you need to achieve your ultimate business goal.
Now, here is an important step. The choice you make will determine how close you are to your goals. Evaluate your options and choose the right vehicle for your cross-functioning organization. For starters, you can look for features like ease of use, level of collaboration, customization options, security features, vendor support, etc. You can consider speaking to your team, and understand what’s best for them before you make a final decision about choosing a tool.
A strong internal knowledge base requires a strong team that works on it. This crew can have the following:
Collectively, these people will ensure that your organization’s knowledge base is organized, up-to-date and that it meets your company’s needs.
Know how organizing your bookshelf makes it easier for you to find what you need when you need it? The same thing applies to your internal knowledge base. You can easily organize content in different formats. Here are a few that you can follow.
Last but not least, don’t miss out on optimizing content with keywords and tags so that users can simply use the share button and find what they need.
Your internal knowledge base shouldn’t be something you create once and got done with it forever. If you are doing that, it’s a big mistake. To use your knowledge base to its maximum output, you should keep tracking the performance and measure its output. For example, look at which articles get the most attention and see if they effectively solve problems. This way, you can continuously keep on refining your content to make your knowledge base a living, breathing resource.
Think of a tool that has both tech-savvy features and effortless usability, making your internal knowledge base not just functional but interaction-worthy. Let us take you through why Documentations.ai is the power puff of knowledge management.
This tool comes with a neat & clean user interface which makes it easier for any user to breeze through it. No complexities, or steep learning curves here - just user-friendly, straightforward intuitive design that helps your team dive right into work.
With Documentations.ai, you can bid adieu to chaotic file management and harmonize all efforts in one seamless platform. This helps everyone be on the same page without much back and forth.
Doesn’t matter if you are tackling multiple tasks or syncing up on project plans, this tool will fit all your organization’s needs and help you maintain the same level of accessibility and organization throughout your documentation.
With its cutting-edge technology yet simple and effective usage, you will have a powerful tool to manage all things knowledge base.
So, if you are looking to supercharge your knowledge base, Documentations.ai can help you create an entire ecosystem that takes responsibility for the effective organization of your documentation and seamless collaboration amongst your team members.
Happy Building!
A few examples of an internal knowledge base are internal wikis, self-service portals, instructional guides, etc. These vary a lot depending on the type of your business.
It’s a central hub of information with literally every detail about the organization, relevant to employees.
Step 1: Do some research
Step 2: Choose a tool
Step 3: Build a team
Step 4: Decide the information, its style, colors, content guidelines, etc.
Step 5: Assign the roles and get rolling.
An internal knowledge base is used by an internal team in the organization.
The knowledge base for external users is for the end customers of the business.