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Technique 1.3: Track Reuse
The ability to associate a system of record (email, case, incident, community thread) with the knowledge that resolves the issue is a critical element of KCS methodology. The data generated by the association is necessary for many Evolve Loop activities, including delivering actionable data to development teams and improving self-service success. Organizations that cannot associate the question asked with the answer provided are at a disadvantage.
The association of knowledge to events is most often done by linking the article to the event in the system of record.
Linking to an Existing KCS Article
If a KCS article with a relevant resolution is found, it should be linked to the event in the system of record. The existing article should be updated (improved) with any additional symptoms or relevant environment information.
If a relevant article is not found in the knowledge base, a new article should be created. Ideally, we already have a Work In Progress (WIP) article or case notes with the words and phrases used to search.
- If the requestor started in self-service, the words they initially used to search should be captured.
- The WIP contains the notes captured during the problem-solving process.
- Update the resolution field (and the cause field, if appropriate), review the environment statements for relevance, and put the WIP into an appropriate state based on confidence in the article and KCS proficiency level.
A rule of thumb when creating a KCS article is to keep it to one page and insert hyperlinks to other KCS articles and/or specific sections of other resources (policy documents, product manuals, diagnostic guides). Because KCS articles are written in the context of the requestor, the articles can act as a context-sensitive index to other resources. This approach eliminates redundancy and the need to maintain information in several different places.
Linking to Other Sources
No single content resource can hold all knowledge needed to solve all issues. Use of links to reference documentation in KCS articles allows more experienced users to move quickly through the content and at the same time enables less experienced users to understand and implement a complex resolution.
Linking to Non-KCS Content
When indexing multiple repositories or databases with a variety of different types of content, linking to the non-KCS content that resolves the issue is recommended if the following criteria are met:
- The information is captured in a maintained repository or database
- The specific resolution or answer is findable by search
- It is accessible by the audience being served (internal or external users)
- The content is in the context of the audience that is looking for it (they can find it using their words and phrases and they can use and/or understand it)
When these criteria are met, the links to other types of content satisfy the fundamental goal of KCS: create findable, usable knowledge for a specific audience. In this situation, creating a KCS article would add little or no value. Links to other types of content that satisfy the above criteria should be counted in reuse counts, link rates, and the new versus known analysis so that we can see the trends and patterns of reuse.
An important rule of thumb is to avoid duplication of content; whenever possible, link to content that already exists. When linking to non-KCS content from a KCS article the same criteria listed above applies. If all the criteria is not met, the content should be copied and placed in the article.