Are you taking advantage of the Tribal Knowledge within your organization and capitalizing on it?

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It is always interesting to me High angle view of business people working on the meeting.that companies are constantly looking outside of their organizations for the panacea to solve whatever problem they have, instead of looking inward and taking advantage of what they already know. Specifically, in sales organizations there is a ton of experience and “tribal knowledge” that exists around: who your best target market and prospects are, what is the best way to get a prospect to open up and talk with you, what are the best marketing assets that really hit home with prospects, etc.

To be quite honest, I find that most organizations don’t take advantage of the tribal knowledge they have within their own organization and capitalize on it. Most don’t seem to have a process in place to capture it and archive it, so that it can be shared with the rest of the organization. This is a huge oversight and a waste of your corporate intellect, which robs those people who could use it to be more effective and productive. There are some great sales enablement tools out there, such as CollaboRate™, that provide templates around your prospect, products, competition, business, etc., and offer a formal structured way in which your tribal knowledge can be captured and leveraged.

In today’s tough competitive market you need to utilize all of the knowledge and experience you have so that you can be more efficient and effective. Why reinvent the wheel, when you have a lot of what you need within your own reach?  I suggest that you take an assessment of the knowledge and experience within your organization and start cataloging it, so it can be available for everyone to take advantage of.

Those organizations that overlook or ignore the value of the tribal knowledge and experience of their people simply aren’t taking advantage of some very valuable corporate assets. Is there some work involved in gathering that knowledge? Of course there is, however if you solicit your sales people to collaborate and help with the process, this will let them know that you believe they have something of value to offer. You might just uncover some very valuable nuggets of knowledge that you didn’t know you had. I believe that everyone has something of value to offer. Even your worst sales person probably has something he/she knows that is worth sharing.

I suggest that you consider what I have written about and if you don’t already have a process in place to capture and utilize the tribal knowledge and experiences within your organization, then you make a commitment to start. 2014 is going to be a growth year and I believe that the economy is going to offer some great opportunities for those that are prepared to take advantage of them. Will you and your organization be one of those to do that?  At least that’s the way I see it, what say you?

About the author:

Chuck Carey is an accomplished sales, marketing and business executive with more than 40 years of experience in the information technology industry. Chuck’s vast knowledge of the problems facing all types of organizations around identifying and capturing corporate knowledge makes him ideally suited to work with and consult in that area. If you would like to see if Chuck can help you and your organization please contact him through this website.



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