Knowledge: Is your organization smart? By Jessica Zuhlsdorf, Jessicaz@spicecsm.com – 315-274-9070
How effective is it having an actively used knowledge base? How many times have you needed information and had to search for it? Many times people who need quick answers get online and search… www.google.com, www.yahoo.com, www.wikipedia.com etc. Well wouldn’t that be nice to have in your organization when looking for answers?
Often times we take for granted how easy we can make it for our people to find the knowledge that they need. Why would we want to? Instead let’s make it easier on our customer care folks and give them the answers they need.
Types of Knowledge:
1. FAQ’s
2. White Papers
3. User Manuals
4. Guided Process
What will this do for you? Well let’s see….. How much does it cost you per minute to provide support for your customers? The longer it takes to find the answers the longer it will take to complete the incident. Also, let’s make our customers happy by giving them faster more knowledgeable service. With that said, providing knowledge can allow us to focus more on providing excellent customer service. How do we do this? Well, providing more knowledge to your employees at their fingertips allows you to hire based on “soft skills” and not so much on technical knowledge.
Let’s face it, training costs businesses a lot of money per year multiply that by turnover and that is a big dollar amount. If you can provide knowledge at their desks, and not count on them retaining this during their training then you will ultimately cut costs. All learning does not have to be done in a classroom setting. By utilizing a knowledge tool you can teach them the process and information while they perform the duties and continue to make your customers happy. Let’s take a different attitude… how about changing your culture? Allowing editable knowledge articles you can also “empower” your employees to add to the content, this will allow the most up to date information why allowing them to feel good about providing input. Let your more experienced leaders and even management participate in this. Having a corporate culture that strives in learning is ultimately going to boost your success.