Knowledge transfer

One of the biggest challenges facing organisations today is how to retain talented people.  They have built up knowledge on which the organisation depends.  Sometimes they move to another organisation.  Ultimately they retire.

Any organisation should be keeping a check on which people have knowledge which is critical to the business and which would be difficult to replace if they left.

All organisations should also have procedures in place to capture and transfer valuable knowledge from people when they do leave - at retirement or sooner.

This can be seen as the end of a career-long process which begins when a new recruit joins an organisation and goes through induction - picking up knowledge from the organisation which is necessary to do the job.  Promotions, reassignments and secondments are other stages along the way where knowledge should flow both ways between the employee and others in the organisation.

Increasingly, much of the knowledge which individuals build up during their careers is held in their heads, making it difficult to transfer that tacit knowledge before they leave. 

However, at all stages from induction to departure, the effective transfer of knowledge is critical to organisational performance.  If new employees can get up to speed more quickly, whilst those who are retiring yield their secrets to their successors, there will be real tangible benefits to the business.