NAME: KHUMALO THABANI

STUDENT NUMBER: N0199055W

DEPARTMENT: LIBRARY AND INFORMATION SCIENCE

FACULTY: COMMUNICATION AND INFORMATION SCIENCE

COURSE: KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT STRATEGIES

LECTURER N. GUVAVA

QUESTION: ASSESS THE RATIONALE FOR KNOWLEGDE RETENTION (KR)

AND TECHNIQUES USED TO ENSURE EFFECTIVE KR
Capturing knowledge within the organization in order to use it later is known as knowledge
retention or knowledge continuity (Levy, 2011). Knowledge retention can be defined more
simply as the process of retaining or preserving crucial information that is at danger of being
lost so that it can be quickly accessible and applied in the future. To ascertain whether the
data is pertinent or helpful to the organization, an audit might be performed. KR, is a branch
of knowledge management, focuses on preventing organizations from losing the knowledge
held by knowledge workers who leave the company. Both system-based and human-based
knowledge transfer facilitators are listed by Hayward-Wright (2009) as being essential for
knowledge retention. Any knowledge found in an organization falls under one of these
categories, and one may find one or both of these types of enablers for knowledge to be kept.

The knowledge resources that are at risk and need to be retained will be identified through a
knowledge retention rationale or strategy, and then particular actions will be put into place to
keep these resources within the company. Success depends on effective knowledge sharing
and establishing a culture of knowledge sharing and learning, just like the majority of other
KM-related activities and tactics. Doan et al (2011) identify three basic questions that must
be asked when considering knowledge retention What knowledge may be lost? What are the
organizational consequences of losing that knowledge? What actions can be taken to retain
that knowledge? With that understanding the organisations will then design techniques to
retain knowledge.

This paper will first examine mentoring programs and job shadowing as techniques for
knowledge retention. A form of training called job shadowing involves one individual
following a more seasoned colleague and seeing how they perform their job. Job shadowing
is a great approach to pick up useful knowledge and strategies from those with more
expertise. It's a very efficient method of instruction that gives the trainee the chance to raise
questions and receive prompt responses. This method has some undeniable advantages,
making it by far the most successful one for knowledge retention as it creates a deeper
understanding of the trainee’s role and the he/she will know what problems the organisations
has and may have potential solutions to them. However, as previously stated, job shadowing
may not be successful if the mentor withholds some knowledge and practical abilities; as a
result, it solely depends on the mentor providing all the knowledge and experiences.
Job rotation is one of many methods that many organizations use to maintain successful KR;
it is a program that may be used to shift employees, either temporarily or permanently,
through various roles within an organization. Employees who are rotated around the
organization learn more about its objectives and duties on an individual basis. According to
A. Giddy, 2022, skill development is a benefit of this method since it exposes existing
workers to a variety of jobs, departments, and teams, allowing them to use abilities that they
might not normally be able to use in their core roles. This can involve both concrete skills—
like learning a new process—and intangible skills—like getting along with a diverse group of
people. This method has many advantages, including increasing employee knowledge and
assisting them in discovering their latent talents. Despite having all the necessary components
to produce a successful KR, job rotations have several drawbacks that could render the KR
ineffective. Not all employees will be enthusiastic about expanding their skill set and
participating in a job rotation program; as a result, they become hesitant and reduce
production. This is one of the main drawbacks impeding a successful KR. The
implementation of a program must involve extensive consultation with the person because
pressuring people into the program might be counterproductive.

More so, Nikhil. D, 2021 assets effectiveness of an exit interview program should be
measured by the positive change it generates. Exit interviews are essential for an organisation
since learning the reasons behind an employee's departure provides insight that could aid in
the expansion of the organisation. For instance, if a worker quits because they were offered a
better salary at another. The manager has learned that pay adjustments for the employee need
to be made. Exit interviews (EI) can also be conducted to gather knowledge about a resigning
or leaving employee’s progress at work as they will be handing over the duties to a colleague
and by doing so the colleague has a better understand on where to start off or continuing the
unfinished projects. “Too often exit interview programs fail to either improve retention or
produce useful information. We’ve identified two reasons why. The first is data quality. The
usefulness of an EI depends utterly on the honesty and forthrightness of the departing
employee…and the second reason is a lack of consensus on best practices. The goals,
strategies, and execution of EI programs vary widely, and the findings and recommendations
from empirical studies are often vague or conflicting. But in our view, the deepest problem is
that many organizations use EI programs as an excuse not to have meaningful retention
conversations with current employees” (Everett. S, 2016).
Utilizing retired staff is another efficient strategy for preserving organisational expertise.
Going to the individual who has carried out a given organisational method for years is the
best way to discover how it should be done. According to the well-known African saying,
"when an old man dies, a library burns." This is a good illustration of how valuable retired
workers can be for organisational development. However, this method has certain drawbacks,
including the potential for failing to reach-out on the retired employee and the risk of the
employee forgetting important information if they have been retired for an extended period of
time. This technique is makes it impossible to retain large amounts of knowledge however, if
one wants to check on particular ways to conduct a certain task it is the best tools as he/she
gets the information directly from the horses’ mouth.

Furthermore, Muhammad Imran, 2020 proposes questions that should be asked to conduct a
successful KR program. Question such as what is the reason for the loss of knowledge? This
helps the manager determine where the problem is, for instance if information is lost because
employees retire there for measures such as consulting retired workers are easily
implemented from there. Another question proposed is, “what action or plan should be taken
to retain that knowledge?” From this one formulates strategy or technique to retain the
knowledge such as the ones mentioned above. This is of importance in order to have positive
results, as adopting a technique without thoroughly evaluating it may not be as fruitful as one
would have hoped and therefore wasting time. The last question proposed is, “what are the
effects on the organisation of losing that knowledge?”. Some of the knowledge may be lost
because it has not been used for a long period of time, therefore this question helps in
determining the value or relevance of the information. This acts as time saving component as
KR is conducted knowing knowledge retained is beneficial to the organisation rather than
sailing blindly hoping the knowledge obtained is of importance

Conclusively, KR is mostly effective when participants are will to share the knowledge, one
may come up with a good strategy or technique that suits organisation however it becomes
less effective when the subjects are not willing or are hesitant to participate. Therefore, when
determining the effectiveness of the techniques and the rationale of Knowledge Retention one
has to consider the fact that people may not comply. As it has been noted above most of the
techniques such are exit interviews, consulting retired workers and job rotation they rely on
employees to be willing to share knowledge.
References:

Leonard, D., Swap, W., & Barton, G. (2014). Critical knowledge transfer: Tools for
managing your company’s deep smarts. Boston: Harvard Business Press.

Nikhil, D. (2021) Exit Interview: an HR tool to increase employee retention rate:

https://in.linkedin.com/in/nikhildegada?trk=pulse-article_main-author-card retrieved on 15
Oct 2022

Everette, S., Boris, G. (2016) Making Exit Interviews Count: This underused practice can be
a powerful tool for retention. https://hbr.org/2016/04/making-exit-interviews-count retrieved
on 15 Oct 2022

Muhammad, I Sagheer, H., Mehak, S. (2020) Impact of Knowledge Sharing and Knowledge
Retention on Employees Development through the Mediation of Sustainable Competitive
Advantage and Moderation of Transformational Leadership: International Review of
Management and Marketing
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/342754373_Impact_of_Knowledge_Sharing_and_
Knowledge_Retention_on_Employees_Development_through_the_Mediation_of_Sustainabl
e_Competitive_Advantage_and_Moderation_of_Transformational_Leadership, retrieved on
15 Oct 2022