Public Safety Insights Newsletter: 8 Steps to Preserving Institutional Knowledge

8 Steps to Preserving Institutional Knowledge
Public Safety Insight:	The loss of institutional knowledge can be a major threat to public safety. Leaders can mitigate this vulnerability by developing and implementing a process to capture and share that knowledge effectively.

 

The elements of a perfect storm that threatens public safety are in place. A large number of public safety professionals are retiring and taking their years of institutional knowledge with them. Agencies generally lack effective succession processes that could help mitigate this vulnerability. And the public and decision-makers remain uneducated about the need to allocate resources to support the behind-the-scenes processes that help keep them safe.

One way to thrive despite this storm is to develop a process that reduces your community’s vulnerability by retaining, sharing, and using your agency’s institutional knowledge. Ideally this process would exist within the context of a robust succession process. However, it also may be developed and implemented on its own. Here are eight steps for creating an effective knowledge management process:

1. Specify a champion who has accountability for implementing this process
   This person must be an active advocate who has the authority to match the responsibility for capturing, sharing, and using institutional knowledge.

2. Identify the desired information
   Ask questions such as, “What do the people in each job need to know, and how do they obtain that knowledge?” and “What problems have arisen? How have we resolved them successfully?”

3. Prioritize the information
   Triage the information by listing it in order of importance and/or urgency. For example, if the only subject matter expert is retiring next month, obtaining the knowledge in his/her head goes to the top of the list. If a recurring problem results in a negative impact on public safety, sharing and using the informationneeded to address it becomes a high priority.

4. Determine where, and in what form, the information is located
   Who are the subject matter experts? Does the information currently exist – e.g., in a report tossed in someone’s drawer, in an old training manual?

5. Identify various methods to obtain and preserve the information
   For example, interview your experts, document their relevant stories, have them demonstrate skills, allow members to shadow them, and provide formal and informal mentoring opportunities.

   Train student interns, cadets, and/or CERT members how to extract the information (e.g., conduct interviews) and have them transcribe the taped interviews. Provide them with a script that covers the what, how, and why.

6. Share the information
   Create desk manuals, searchable knowledge briefs, process visuals, and YouTube videos. Discuss the information around the kitchen table. Identify the learning points in stories. Specify what’s in it for people to learn and use the information.

7. Use the information
    Provide opportunities to practice the skills and apply the information, such as through job shadow programs and special projects.

8. Evaluate the results and tweak the process as necessary
   Design evaluation into the knowledge management process so you are able to assess its success in reaching its stated goals.

Creating a safe, healthy, economically viable community requires you to use resources effectively and efficiently. A viable knowledge management process will enable you to obtain and capture information on a regular basis, and to disseminate it through a variety of media. Don’t wait until people are walking out the door: start today.

To learn about how to create effective knowledge briefs, take a look at our article Knowledge Briefs: The Succession Planning Tool with Benefits.

To find articles and resources that may be of value to you, I invite you to visit my web site at www.PublicSafetyInsights.net.

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©2015 Pat Lynch | Public Safety Insights