Two heads are better than one. This wise, old saying rings particularly true in today’s business world, where collaboration and communication are crucial to achieve growth and success. And this is where knowledge sharing comes in.

Knowledge sharing is an essential part of making a business successful; it encourages coordination, boosts morale, and helps teams to stay on top of their industry. By understanding and practicing effective knowledge sharing, companies can unlock their team members’ potential and increase productivity and growth, especially when remote work is present. Who wouldn’t want that, right?

Athat’s why we’re writing this article; to help you understand what knowledge sharing is in a business setting, its importance within the workplace and how to overcome knowledge barriers.

What is Knowledge Sharing?

Knowledge sharing is the process of exchanging and distributing information, ideas, and insights among members of an organization. This exchange of information is key for any organization to function efficiently and effectively, and it is a so-called knowledge management process.

A knowledge sharing culture helps members to share best practices, solve challenges together, improve team member coordination, and it can be done in many different ways, such as through conversation, encouraging collaboration, or the use of technology.

Just imagine a team where each of the members is great at something but clueless about other things. If employees are encouraged to share their knowledge and skills with each other, they can all become better and they won’t directly depend on each other as much. Just think how much easier it would be if web developers knew a bit of SEO!

It is also an invaluable tool for organizations to develop creative ideas, identify opportunities, and drive innovation. When knowledge sharing takes place, it is easier for members to make well-informed decisions that are beneficial to the organization’s success.

So remember this, sharing is caring!

Types of Knowledge

Within the knowledge management process, we can refer to two main types of knowledge, depending on its nature and how knowledge sharing happens. So let’s take a look at them.

Explicit Knowledge

Explicit knowledge is the type of knowledge that is codified and can be written down in documents, books, articles, and other forms of media. It usually responds to What is…? and it’s the type of knowledge that we traditionally think of when discussing the term knowledge. It is easily shareable and can be used to educate and inform large numbers of people.

This type of knowledge is often used to create training materials, manuals, textbooks, and other documents. It can also be used to create databases, websites, and other digital resources.

The importance of this kind of knowledge is that it is easily documented and can be relied upon for accuracy.

Tacit Knowledge

Tacit knowledge is knowledge that is typically acquired through experience, intuition, and trial and error. It is usually difficult to explain, and often not deliberately shared.

Tacit knowledge is often referred to as know-how or know-why. It often involves complex processes, such as problem-solving, decision-making, and the understanding of relationships between different elements or combinations of elements.

Examples of tacit knowledge include understanding how to interact with people and how different situations should be handled, or knowing when to speak in a meeting or how to write an email and phrase your sentences to achieve the desired result.

While it can also be documented to some extent, the best way to share tacit knowledge is through collaboration, training and mentorship.

And now that we’re familiar with the culture of knowledge sharing and the different types of knowledge, let’s take a look at the main benefits within the workplace.

Source: https://nimbusweb.me/blog/knowledge-sharing-in-the-workplace/