Has your company adopted using a Wiki or multiple Wikis for storing information, informal learning, etc.? Has it been successful in using it? This topic has been top of mind for me since returning from DevLearn08 and it is really an exciting development in how learning is changing. From formal to informal. From top down to bottom up. Peer led discussion, community grown insight. Very cool indeed!

Our company has been using a wiki for about two years now. It’s great. We store all kinds of archival data, proposals, bios, fun stuff, procedures and process stuff, handbooks, etc. It’s pretty good, really. We grew it organically and haven’t applied a lot of doctrine in the management of it.

However, it hasn’t been without it’s bumps. Getting people to use it as a primary info source, record, etc is not easy. People are used to a public folder in Outlook or a directory on a network share… but gradually this trend is fading. Beyond that, preventing empty pages or information currency problems (gardening old content and pages out) is always going to be an issue with wikis. Really though, the main issue is getting it filled up in the first place. Here are some tips I have come across in my experience in maintaining ours, reading up on Wiki Patterns and just talking to a few other people I know that manage a wiki. I am by no means an expert in this, but in a Wiki who is? I hope these tips help you, and if you have any other original ideas let me know, or join WikiPatterns and contribute!

Here they are:

1. Hold a Barn-raising! – I first heard this from Tony Karrer and have since read up on it at wiki patterns. With a small amount of planning, this could be really successful in creating a few dozen pages to get your site started. Ask your coworkers to come hungry armed with their laptops and their valuable emails and assorted PDFs and word docs they always forward on to coworkers about process, procedures and tips on how to do their jobs. Order some lunch and start editing! Soon your site will be singing with content. In a comfortable environment like this, WikiNoobs can be schooled on how to work in the system. A great side effect of this is that your pages will start to share a voice or common formatting style and that adds value and coherency to the site!
2. Have a lesser informed or rookie employee fill up some pages with scaffolded content. This content just needs to be ‘kinda’ close. Then, have that same worker send the link on to a superior or mentor for final edit. Showing your expertise can be a strong motivator for some, so by creating a basic framework for content, you are priming the pump and creating an incentive!
3. Go easy on the WikiFormatting! I like HTML. I’m used to it. Many editors are by now. WikiMarkup, or WikiText can be a bit tricky to get used to. It’s got all kinds of rules and things that can easy to implement if you haven’t spent a few years editing web pages already. But for a seasoned web designer, it can feel like training wheels. In this vein, too much focus on making things pretty can slow things down in the creation of a basic wiki’s content. I’m not sure if noticed this on the WikiPatterns site listed as an anti-pattern, but I have just really recently started digging in to this site, so it may be there.
4. Just make it a requirement. Every employee should at least be in charge of their own bio page, right? I would argue that they should not only be editing their profile/bio, but also maintaining a process page if the if they are project manager, contributing to a project’s case study if they were the designer or developer for it, you see where I am going. Simply make it a part of a project’s delivery phase and there you go. Easier said than done, right?
5. Use the Wiki’s ‘Special Pages’. MediaWiki has a “Special:Specialpages” page that lists dead-end pages, orphaned pages, basic stats, most linked to, least linked etc. These links and tools will help you, the editor, manager, etc keep your wiki fresh. Not to be overlooked!

So that’s it for now. I’m going to continue editing my Wiki, and reading Wiki Pattterns. I’m very interested how you are using your Wiki at your work, and hearing your success and trials. Let me know what you are doing with ‘em!

Posted on December 1, 2008

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