How this project is shaped
Methodology & Sources
Practice KM is an educational synthesis. The sources below informed its framing and examples; they are not presented as a single adopted framework, endorsement, or certification basis.
How Practice KM approaches Knowledge Management
Connect the environments without confusing them.
Knowledge is developed and applied by people.
Organizations also depend on explicit information, content, records, systems, structures, and governance.
Knowledge Management connects these environments so knowledge can be developed, preserved, transferred, found, trusted, applied, and improved.
Tacit and explicit knowledge should not be treated as interchangeable. Capturing information from a person does not reproduce that person’s full experience or judgment.
One cumulative conceptual journey.
The site moves from the nature of knowledge to transfer, capture, information governance, access, risk, measurement, organizational capability, and maturity. Each interactive model is intended to demonstrate a mechanism or relationship, not simply decorate the page. The lessons simplify complex subjects for educational clarity without claiming that every organization will implement KM identically.
Sources and influencesRead further by lesson or topic.
These references were checked against their original publisher, standards body, or institution. Practice KM uses them as influences and signposts; external organizations do not endorse this project.
Foundational Knowledge Management
Practice KM treats Knowledge Management as a connected organizational system: people, information, process, governance, culture, and technology working together around a real need.
- ISO 30401:2018 — Knowledge management systems — RequirementsThe published international standard provides requirements and guidance for establishing, implementing, maintaining, reviewing, and improving a knowledge management system.
- ISO/TC 260 — Knowledge management systemsThe ISO technical committee overview describes knowledge as context-sensitive understanding developed through interactions among people, information, work, experience, reflection, and learning.
- APQC’s Knowledge Management FrameworkA practical reference for designing, implementing, sustaining, measuring, and improving an organizational KM program.
Data, information, knowledge, and insight
The opening lesson uses a driving scene to distinguish recorded observations from organized information, context-aware knowledge, and an informed decision.
Tacit knowledge, explicit knowledge, and knowledge creation
The journey distinguishes knowledge developed by people from the information and content that organizations can store, describe, govern, and make available. A captured artifact can support another person’s understanding without reproducing the source person’s complete experience or judgment.
Knowledge transfer, retention, and organizational learning
The lifecycle and transfer lessons emphasize that availability is not the same as demonstrated capability. Learning loops depend on context, practice, feedback, application, and maintenance.
- NASA Knowledge ManagementNASA’s public KM resources connect critical knowledge, continuity, learning, capture, transfer, and reuse to mission performance.
- NASA Lessons LearnedNASA’s collect, record, disseminate, and apply lifecycle provides an established example of a non-linear organizational learning loop.
- British Columbia Public Service — Knowledge transfer lifecycleA public-sector lifecycle connecting onboarding, capability development, knowledge use and sharing, succession, and offboarding.
Knowledge transfer and organizational learning
Transfer is framed as a progression from exposure through explanation, practice, feedback, teach-back, and independent application. Documents can support that work, but cannot substitute for context-aware learning.
The Knowledge Management Landscape
The Landscape is Practice KM’s educational synthesis of five overlapping areas around Knowledge in Work. It organizes canonical concepts and relationships for progressive disclosure; it is not presented as a universal or empirically validated KM standard.
Human Knowledge Exchange
This lesson shows how people with partial experience and context compare perspectives, ask questions, challenge assumptions, and develop richer shared understanding and continuing practice.
Knowledge capture
Capture is deliberately partial: it expresses useful actions, signals, reasoning, exceptions, and context so an asset can be governed and reused without claiming to copy a person’s mind.
- NASA Knowledge ManagementNASA’s current public resources address critical knowledge, continuity, knowledge capture, knowledge sharing, and knowledge transfer.
- NASA Lessons LearnedA current reference for collecting, recording, disseminating, applying, and maintaining lessons from experience.
- British Columbia Public Service — Capturing and transferring knowledgePractical guidance on selecting capture and transfer approaches according to the people, knowledge, location, accessibility, and desired evidence of successful transfer.
Content, records, taxonomy, metadata, and information access
The explicit-information lessons use lifecycle, governance, records, metadata, taxonomy, and access practices to show why reliable information depends on more than a repository or search box.
- AIIM — What is Enterprise Content Management?AIIM describes ECM as a combination of strategies, methods, and tools used to capture, manage, store, preserve, and deliver information across its lifecycle rather than as one technology or repository.
- ISO 15489-1:2016 — Records management — Concepts and principlesThe current records-management standard covers records, metadata, responsibilities, controls, and the creation, capture, and management of records over time.
- DCMI Metadata TermsThe Dublin Core Metadata Initiative’s maintained vocabulary provides established properties, classes, and relationships for describing resources.
Taxonomy, metadata, and information access
Metadata describes an item, taxonomy supplies governed concepts and relationships, and tagging connects controlled language with the terms people actually use.
- W3C SKOS Simple Knowledge Organization System ReferenceThe W3C recommendation defines concept schemes, preferred and alternative labels, and broader, narrower, and related semantic relationships.
- W3C SKOS PrimerAn accessible introduction to representing thesauri, taxonomies, controlled vocabularies, subject headings, synonyms, and concept relationships using SKOS.
- DCMI Metadata TermsAn authoritative maintained specification for metadata properties, classes, vocabulary-encoding schemes, and resource relationships.
Information access
Putability, findability, searchability, recognition, accessibility, and feedback form one contribution-to-use path. Search is one route through that path, not a repair for missing or ungoverned content.
- DCMI Metadata TermsDescriptive metadata and explicit relationships support navigation, browsing, discovery, retrieval, and interpretation.
- W3C SKOS Simple Knowledge Organization System ReferenceControlled labels, synonyms, and semantic relationships support multiple paths for recognizing and finding information.
- W3C Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2WCAG provides the primary accessibility guidance used for perceivable content, semantic controls, keyboard operation, focus, reflow, contrast, and text alternatives.
Risk, measurement, governance, and maturity
The risk, metrics, framework, and maturity lessons connect knowledge needs to ownership, evidence, proportionate treatment, organizational capability, and improvement decisions.
- ISO 31000:2018 — Risk management — GuidelinesThe current international guidance supports identifying, analyzing, evaluating, treating, monitoring, and communicating risk in a way customized to organizational context.
- NASA Knowledge ManagementNASA’s focus on critical knowledge, knowledge continuity, and mission consequences provides a concrete example of knowledge-risk thinking.
- ISO 30401:2018 — Knowledge management systems — RequirementsThe management-system framing informs the emphasis on organizational context, leadership, responsibilities, operation, evaluation, and continual improvement.
Intranet as a Knowledge Environment
The intranet lesson distinguishes an employee-facing environment from ECM. It synthesizes governed information, structure and discovery, people and communities, services, workflow, ownership, and feedback without positioning a particular vendor product.
Measurement and improvement
Practice KM treats counts as activity evidence, not value by themselves. Useful measurement follows evidence toward adoption, quality, capability, risk, performance, outcomes, and a decision.
A Knowledge Management Framework
The operating Framework is Practice KM’s educational and professional-practice synthesis of the shared five-area model, organizational conditions, workflow integration, ownership, evidence, and feedback. It is not presented as a universal or empirically validated organizational blueprint.
- ISO 30401:2018 — Knowledge management systems — RequirementsThe standard provides a system-level reference for organizational context, leadership, support, operation, evaluation, and improvement.
- APQC’s Knowledge Management FrameworkA practical influence for connecting business needs, KM strategy, approaches, capabilities, measures, and sustained improvement.
- APQC Knowledge Management Strategic FrameworkAn interactive reference for the stages, actions, and organizational decisions involved in developing and sustaining KM capability.
Knowledge Management Maturity Model
The maturity model in this repository is a research-informed educational model with five stages, ten dimensions, forty-eight capabilities, and twenty self-check questions. It is scope-specific and indicative rather than a certification, benchmark, or universal organizational label.
- ISO 30401:2018 — Knowledge management systems — RequirementsA system-level reference for governance, organizational context, evaluation, and continual improvement; Practice KM does not reproduce or certify against the standard.
- APQC’s Knowledge Management FrameworkA practical influence for capability-oriented, evidence-aware, and improvement-focused KM program design.
- Teah, Pee, and Kankanhalli — Development and Application of a General Knowledge Management Maturity ModelA five-stage general KM maturity model organized around people, process, and technology, with an accompanying assessment approach.
- Pee and Kankanhalli — A Model of Organizational Knowledge Management Maturity Based on People, Process, and TechnologyA later formulation and initial validation of the General KM Maturity Model’s staged, cumulative view of KM development.
- Bougoulia and Glykas — Knowledge management maturity assessment frameworks: A proposed holistic approachA systematic review of KM maturity models, their shortcomings and implementation gaps, followed by a broader ISO-informed assessment proposal.
- National Archives — Records Management Maturity ModelA public-sector example of using maturity dimensions to identify strengths, weaknesses, risks, and priorities for improvement.
- ARMA — Information Governance Implementation ModelAn implementation-oriented information-governance model that separates functional areas rather than relying only on one aggregate label.
- CMMI Institute — Levels of Capability and PerformanceA reference for cumulative capability and maturity stages in which higher levels add rigor and capability to the practices established below them.
- CDC CCQDER — Cognitive InterviewingGuidance on evaluating how respondents interpret and answer questions, identifying response error, and improving question validity.
- AAPOR — Best Practices for Survey ResearchSurvey-design guidance used as a reference for restrained claims, understandable questions, appropriate response options, and transparent interpretation.
- British Columbia Public Service — Knowledge transfer processA practical source for knowledge identification, prioritization, transfer, continuity, storage, ownership, security, and maintenance capabilities.
- NIST — Artificial Intelligence Risk Management Framework: Generative AI ProfileA current risk-management reference for the responsible governance, use, evaluation, and oversight of generative AI capabilities.
Accessibility and interactive explanation design
Interactive models are used to demonstrate mechanisms and relationships. They retain a readable textual explanation, native controls, visible focus, keyboard access, responsive layouts, and reduced-motion behavior.
- W3C Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2The primary accessibility reference for perceivable content, semantic structure, keyboard operation, focus, contrast, reflow, target spacing, and text alternatives.
- Distill — Communicating with Interactive ArticlesA research-informed design reference for purposeful interaction, reader control, multiple representations, segmentation, prediction, explanation, and accessible alternatives.