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Search and RetrievalAn organisation's first steps into Knowledge Management are usually taken with the installation of a wide ranging search and retrieval system that allows its users to find data regardless of where it is stored in the organisation. The key components are illustrated in the diagram. Each of these layers is relatively self-explanatory although some may come as a surprise such as the access control layer (you wouldn't want your colleagues reading your private email would you?). The entire system is driven by the availability of data. We have identified four distinct categories of data that can be used in Knowledge Management projects. 
Run your mouse over the diagram to find out more. Access control restrictions must be honoured. You shouldn't be able to see any data that you're not supposed to see! Behavioural data covers things you can extract from the IT systems that describe what your workforce is doing. In the first instance this might include which web sites they're surfing frequently or perhaps extracting an organisational structure from information held in the telephone directory on the corporate intranet. The fourth type of data is co-operative data. Largely driven by the growth of web systems (e.g. corporate intranets) and the availability of video / application conferencing in recent years. A content management layer is used to organise the data at the point where the data is submitted to the system. Some content management systems even build the index on behalf of the search engine to improve performance. The data can come from many sources: existing files, databases, your workflow system, email or web pages. In rare cases an organisations data is made directly and freely available to everyone. Some companies (especially investment banks) have used middleware or an ‘information bus’ to deliver their institutional data to users. Institutional data is the stuff you'd already regard as data - files on a disk, email etc. Personalisation might include tailoring the way you want results presented (visual personalisation) or perhaps the data sources or categories you prefer to use for your searches (semantic personalisation). The Presentation layer allows you to see the results. This might be via a browser or perhaps an emailed report. The search engine runs through its index to try to obtain a match for the things you're looking for. Synthesized data is knowledge you've explicitely captured in an IT system. An example would be capturing the knowledge of an expert in your organisation and making it available to a wider audience. |
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