WIIF - Whats In It For Me?
Lets assume for arguments sake that a open and sharing culture does not exist in the enterprise. Why would your teams want to contribute to a wiki, whats in it for them?
People wont put in, unless they can get something out. For the team I was working with, the remote staff were used to doing their work without collaboration, and if they did not know the answer to a question they would then either try and find it, or, the customer would just not get that service. Many staff were also not aware that a problem had already been solved, and thus would go about solving it again introducing costly re-work to the process.
So, explaining the virtue's of wiki collaboration to all staff is important, but, framing the "Whats in it for me" message is critical to getting buy in, staff need to get a reward for their effort (and I am not talking about pay increases!).
The problem we all face here is that we will generally start with a blank wiki, so I am putting information in during the early days, but there is little information for me to take out, and thus interest slows very quickly as it is seen only as an administrative waste of time. There are three approaches to this problem -
1. Pre-populate with information already available
2. Identify change agents, and ensure they keep populating and promoting
3. Ensure the use of the wiki is well defined, and that you are not duplicating activity
Point 1 - It would generally not be the case where information could be ported into a blank wiki to get things going. If you can do this, then do, but be sure that you are not importing irrelevant or out of date information. It would be better to leave that behind (refer Tip 3)
Point 2 - Change agents are very important. They can see the goal, and will continue to push on during the tough times. Identify the people who will act as a change agent, and support them in getting information into the wiki, and promoting its use to their colleagues. Over time it will generally become obvious to everyone what you are trying to achieve, and the value you are adding, however it does take time for some people, and I think you need to give them the time to work it out. Your change agents are critical in "keeping the dream alive"
Point 3 - I will elaborate more on this one in my next tip! (tip 3)
