Three Ways Generative AI Can Accelerate Knowledge Transfer Across An Organization

Today’s enterprises have greater potential than ever before to access vast amounts of data, which can be used to accelerate collaboration and productivity across teams. According to a report by MIT Sloan, up to 80 percent of this information is defined as unstructured data, or information that exists in the form of documents, images, video, audio, and social media. Unstructured data also includes the knowledge and experience that exists in the minds of leaders within the business, also referred to as “tribal knowledge” and consisting of best practices and procedures for workarounds.

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The primary challenge that companies face when trying to leverage the power of their unstructured data is the fact that much of it is often stored in a disparate and siloed manner. Think about how much of this data is floating around within an organization – from instructional videos in a digital library to spreadsheets and workflow documents that are stored on a server or even in a filing cabinet, to the institutional knowledge of colleagues who have been with an organization for many years. Now, visualize how challenging it can be for employees to gain quick access to the information they need to optimize their work. New employees especially are put to task as they try to glean knowledge about the organization, its workflows and operational processes, and projects they will work on. On average, employees can spend 3.6 hours per day looking up relevant information to do their work.

This is where innovations in Generative AI (GenAI) can really come into play for business planning. GenAI technologies can streamline information and drive step-change knowledge-sharing capabilities and productivity improvements across an organization. If an enterprise planning software platform pairs GenAI capabilities with digital twin technology, companies could gain unprecedented, end-to-end knowledge visibility into their operations and then connect this information to their planning processes and decision-making across supply chain planning, procurement, finance, marketing, and sales, as well as interactions with outside suppliers and customers.

With GenAI, employees can quickly and efficiently gain greater insight into their company’s unstructured data and tribal knowledge. As such, the transfer of knowledge and essential information will be accelerated, increasing expertise levels across the organization.

Here are a few examples of how GenAI can break down unstructured data silos and benefit your workforce:

Enhance the onboarding experience

Onboarding employees is one of the most critical stages of joining an organization. According to a Harris poll conducted by CareerBuilder, companies that lack a structured onboarding process can experience a 16% reduction in productivity and a 14% increase in inefficiencies. While the official onboarding process may only last a few days or weeks at most, employees who have joined an organization are going to spend a significant amount of their first six months to one year gaining knowledge about your organization. If employees are pulling data and insights from multiple places where information is stored, it can create a disjointed experience. GenAI applications can make this process more seamless as they can ingest large volumes of unstructured data stored across your organization and turn these data points into knowledge and business insights that new employees can apply directly to their roles.

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New employees can quickly gain an understanding of their company’s end-to-end business overview, from its financials to its corporate filings, customer overview, selling channels, products, suppliers, as well as business process characteristics such as manufacturing, retail and distribution. They can speed up their knowledge of the external drivers that affect the business (i.e., weather, pricing, local events, and more) and can gain in-depth information about their specific job function (i.e., user journey, day in the life, how it fits in overall business process flows and how they impact the business, etc.). For example, if an employee is joining the Purchasing function of the organization, they are able to access this accumulated knowledge about the suppliers and knowledge base on their contract terms, risks, and more., and all of this information is presented as an interactive digital walkthrough from the digital twin of the enterprise.

Bridge the skills gap

Multiple roles and functions across industries are projected to experience a skills gap in the next five to 10 years as greater numbers of experienced professionals prepare for retirement, and not enough new professionals are replacing them. As a result, some industries could experience a significant skills gap that can impact all aspects of the business, from productivity to profitability. For example, in the next five years, there could be a shortage of planning skills in the manufacturing sector. Businesses are going to have to do more with fewer resources and people. However, GenAI platforms can help to bridge this knowledge gap. If an organization begins utilizing AI-powered platforms that can gather, cleanse, and organize the unstructured data and tribal knowledge from seasoned professionals who will be transitioning into retirement in the near future, they will have a strong knowledge base that fellow colleagues and emerging professionals will be able to learn from and apply to their roles.

Expert playbooks accumulated by experienced and expert employees can be digitized and passed down to new employees and those in the earlier stages of their careers. GenAI also acts as a copilot for job functions and as training wheels to guide employees as they upskill. A feedback mechanism can also tailor what they learn and provide feedback through data-driven, post-game analysis to drive continuous improvement.

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Enable employees to access necessary information

Companies that invest in digitizing their organization’s tribal knowledge will enable their workforce to access up-to-date, accurate insights that enable employees at all levels to make critical decisions. For example, envision a pharmaceutical company whose forecast underestimated the need for antibiotics due to a more severe than usual allergy season. Tribal knowledge of the situation was known to the company’s sales teams on the ground via email chatter, was covered in news media, and was available as pollen forecast in the allergy index on weather.com, but the dots were not connected and accessible to all relevant teams. With GenAI, an enterprise planning platform can present a narrative that was missed in the forecast and present a corrective action to improve the forecasting model by adding a new driver to the model (i.e., temperature, humidity and pollen levels, etc.) to improve the pharmaceutical company’s forecast for antibiotics going forward.

Overall, businesses that leverage GenAI technologies make greater strides in unlocking the tribal knowledge that is siloed within their organization. They create business insights that ultimately benefit employees at all stages of their careers and enable continued growth across all roles and functions.

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