In the Industrial Age, land, labor, and capital were a company’s most important assets.  “How much you could produce” was much more important than “what you knew.”  Fast forward to today, and you have what some people call a “Knowledge Economy”—where what you know is your greatest competitive advantage.

In the Knowledge Economy, business has become increasingly complex and interconnected. Today, it’s impossible for one mind to contain all of the answers and expertise to develop a new product or implement a global business strategy. It takes the collective intellect of an entire organization.

Knowledge in business is the accumulated information and experience of an organization put into action. It exists in documents, databases, structured repositories, file cabinets, web pages, and in the minds of employees. Businesses are looking to manage what they’ve learned, what they’ve experienced, and what they know. To re-use ideas. To make knowledge workers more effective. To hold onto valuable knowledge when employees leave. To speed innovation.  To see and seize opportunities. To gain a competitive advantage. That’s why knowledge management is the next evolution in business.