Content/Knowledge Management for U.S. Government Information Sharing
Goal
Develop a collaborative portal and underlying database to Improve access to the right information and job aids in order to improve performance of a critical position and mission success.
Challenges
- Target job population located around the world at various work centers
- Target job population represented specialties in multiple foreign languages, making the task of finding common tools, knowledge nuggets, and critical information all the more difficult
- Performers at each site were developing similar/redundant tools in response to workplace situations and needs
- Stakeholders included multiple intelligence agencies who were not used to collaborating to find a common solution.
Solution
Cognitive's approach was to:
- Select a team of Cognitive Technologies specialists with expertise in knowledge acquisition and content/knowledge management to analyze the information use and sharing needs of the target population of potential system users across numerous government agencies.
- The team visited locations worldwide to interview, observe, and construct a top-level analysis to determine the primary processes or tasks that could be improved by better access to knowledge and information, including job aids. During site visits, our analysts also documented the types of information and job aids in use and how they were being used.
- Develop a database of available job aids and knowledge nuggets and associate these with the appropriate work processes and job tasks.
- Construct a prototype for a web-based content/knowledge management system to demonstrate the efficacy of such a system to enable easy access to information and knowledge to improve job performance. This prototype, as well as the findings of our analysis were made available to an inter-agency committee to demonstrate the value of cross-agency knowledge sharing and collaboration.
Cognitive Value Added
Cognitive Technologies experts:
- Created a "first ever" user-centered requirements and needs analysis representing the input of analysts around the world
- Developed a database of all of the tools, information, knowledge nuggets, job aids, and training that analysts around the world had found useful, were actively using, or had developed. This comprehensive database answered key questions for the client about the types of content and knowledge that were required, as well as the ones already in place. This enabled the client to identify redundant development efforts and consolidate key projects.
- The prototype we developed, named the "Trading Post" could be demonstrated to heads and representatives of multiple agencies, demonstrating interagency cooperation and identifying important next steps to provide the analysts with what they need to enable optimal job performance.