Enterprise Wiki

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An Enterprise Wiki (including corporate wiki , enterprise wiki , enterprise wiki or Organisationswiki ) is a wiki , which offers typical functionalities that are required for enterprise applications. Enterprise wikis are an essential component in the overall context of Enterprise 2.0 .

development

The first enterprise wikis were used for product management in IT projects as early as the mid-1990s.

Wikis enable companies to:

In recent years, semantic wikis have become increasingly popular in corporate use. These allow data to be stored and queried on a wiki page and thus combine the known advantages of a wiki with the possibilities of a database. One of the most established semantic wikis is Semantic MediaWiki . Organizations that use Semantic MediaWiki internally include Pfizer , the Metropolitan Museum of Art , the US Department of Defense and NASA , among others .

The use of semantic enterprise wikis is also interesting for the smart factory in two ways: on the one hand, through simple data integration with existing systems, and, on the other hand, through the combination of human and machine intelligence.

In many companies the organizational structure is very rigid. The use of enterprise wikis can promote informal, social networks and improve the flow of information in the company.

Features of Enterprise Wikis

Enterprise wikis have a greater functionality than conventional wikis. The characteristics of wiki systems in general also apply to enterprise wikis. The following properties and features extend wikis to enterprise wikis:

Easy content creation and editing
The creation and manipulation in enterprise wikis should be as easy as possible, which is why WYSIWYG editors are usually a standard in these wiki systems.
Structuring and navigation
An extended structuring functionality must be available for enterprise wikis in order to be able to map the company organization (or sub-organizations of a company).
Interfaces
Information is very important for companies. It should therefore be possible to integrate or link enterprise wikis into other (already existing) systems of the company (e.g. LDAP connection, export in certain formats, etc.).
Scalability
It is an essential aspect for companies that systems are scalable .
Versioning and traceability
The change control in Enterprise Wikis consists on the one hand of the versioning, which is already known from wikis, and on the other hand of the representation of the last changes in the wiki system. However, the primary task of this is that you get the latest information and can see whether the information or change is relevant for you.
Spam protection does not play a role in operational practice, since employees of a company do not usually delete or change any content maliciously. Some companies even allow anonymous changes to the content. Allowing anonymous changes has the advantage that taboo topics can be addressed and discussed in the company, so it is a decision that essentially depends on a culture of trust that is lived .
User access control
Enterprise wikis support much more extensive user access control than open wikis. In addition to the usual access control after processing actions (e.g. edit, read, delete, etc.), it is necessary to separate projects and departments - i.e. content areas - from one another in company wikis. This is based on the one hand on security requirements, legal data protection reasons (e.g. personal data), but also on consideration of the existing corporate and communication culture.

In addition, many Enterprise Wikis are particularly user-friendly and have an extended search functionality that can also search through the content of attachments (e.g. Lucene ). These features and functions are supported by the use of new software technologies such as Ajax .

Differences between enterprise wikis and public wikis

Enterprise wikis have special features compared to public wikis (such as Wikipedia ). The use of wikis within companies can therefore pose specific challenges:

Motivation to participate
Contributions to public wikis are made without any external obligation. This voluntariness is only partially given in companies. According to a study by Bartel, 50% of those surveyed cited the motivation to participate in the company's internal knowledge communication as the biggest problem when using enterprise wikis.
Quality management and structuring
The large number of users of public wikis enables self-organized structuring and quality assurance of the wiki. Due to the mostly smaller number of users in enterprise wikis, the admin and editor roles are often specifically assigned to specific people.
Accessibility of the wiki
Company-internal wikis usually have a higher degree of social closure than public wikis, which means that they are not accessible to every member of the company in the same way. Restrictions on access rights in enterprise wikis can be necessary for legal reasons, for example.
Harnessing knowledge
Company-internal wikis are often used to process a specific task or a specific project, and the content generated within the wiki is converted directly into organizational decisions. This goal and application orientation of company-internal wikis goes hand in hand with a stronger time limit and thematic closure compared to public wikis.
anonymity
Public wikis allow anonymous use. In contrast, the users of company-internal wikis are often known to each other. In the context of company-internal wikis, for example, there is a “spatial feedback” to real locations when the users of an enterprise wiki meet at a meeting.
Contrast to existing hierarchies
The users of public wikis are in a heterarchical relationship to one another. Internal wiki communication processes can create temporary roles and individual users can achieve a status within the wiki community through the quality and number of their contributions. Enterprise wikis are implemented as part of an already existing organizational structure with mostly hierarchical relationship systems. These existing hierarchies can influence Wiki-internal communication processes.

These special features of enterprise wikis compared to public wikis can have an influence on the cooperation within the wiki. Cooperation and collaboration can be distinguished from one another as forms of cooperation :

In the case of cooperative collaboration , the task to be worked on together is divided into sub-tasks. Specific subtasks are assigned to individuals or groups of people. This assignment can be made hierarchically by assignment or heterarchically by negotiation. The permanent coupling of person and sub-task takes place before starting the task processing.

With collaborative cooperation , everyone participates in all steps of the task processing according to their skills and abilities. There is no assignment of persons or groups of persons to partial tasks, but a temporary and dynamic coupling is possible. Collaborative collaboration is based on heterarchical relationships.

In accordance with the special features of company-internal wikis described, these encourage cooperative collaboration. In contrast, collaborative knowledge production is more likely in public wikis.

Application examples

  • directory
  • Andon board
  • Requirements management
  • CEO blog
  • Document discussions and their results
  • FAQ list
  • Document business processes
  • Sketch, collect and exchange ideas
  • Internal news
  • Intranet
  • Knowledge base for the IT department
  • Competition observation and analysis
  • Keeping personal blogs
  • Project management and documentation
  • Quality management manual
  • Guidelines publishing
  • Corporate glossary
  • Central calendar

Enterprise Wiki Applications

There are many providers of enterprise wikis (see list of wiki software ). The most important ones, which have the required properties, are, for example, MediaWiki , especially with the extension Semantic Mediawiki and its enterprise fork BlueSpice MediaWiki , the easy-to-administer, database- less DokuWiki , the proprietary and company-optimized Confluence , Foswiki , PmWiki , TWiki .

So far, no system has prevailed because, depending on the application, z. B. in the context of knowledge management, the strengths and weaknesses of different wiki systems have different effects.

literature

  • S. Blaschke: Wikis in Organizations: From Communication to Collaboration. In: P. Alpar, S. Blaschke: Web 2.0: An empirical inventory. Vieweg + Teubner, Wiesbaden 2008, pp. 183-203.
  • A. Ebersbach among others: Cooperation on the web. 2nd Edition. Springer Verlag, Berlin / Heidelberg 2008.
  • R. Edmonds: Up to the grassroots. In: e.learning age. 10/2006, pp. 14-16.
  • B. Krabina: Knowledge management with wikis . In: B. Lutz, (Ed.): Knowledge in dialogue . Contributions to the Krems Knowledge Management Days 2012 Edition Danube University Krems, 2013. ( online as PDF )
  • C. Lange: Wikis and Blogs - Set up and manage planning . C&L Computer und Literaturverlag, Böblingen 2007.
  • F. Mayer, D. Schoeneborn: WikiWebs in organizational communication. In: Ch. Stegbauer, MH Jäckel: Social Software. Forms of cooperation in computer-based networks. VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, Wiesbaden 2008, pp. 137–153.
  • C. Müller, P. Dibbern: Self-organized knowledge management in companies based on Wiki technology - a use case. In: HMD - Praxis der Wirtschaftsinformatik. Issue 252/2006, pp. 45-54.
  • JS Schmalz: Between cooperation and collaboration, between hierarchy and heterarchy. Organizational principles and structures of wikis. In: communication @ society. 8/5, 2007. ( online as PDF )
  • M. Seibert, S. Preuss, M. Rauer: Enterprise Wikis - The successful introduction and use of wikis in companies . Gabler Verlag, Wiesbaden 2011, ISBN 978-3-8349-2827-6 .

Web links

Wikibooks: Wikis in organizations  - learning and teaching materials

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Ward Cunningham : What is a Wiki. WikiWikiWeb , June 27, 2002, accessed June 15, 2008 .
  2. ^ Bio-IT World 2009, Track 3
  3. ^ Bringing the Semantic Web to Museums , Paul Miller, January 27, 2009.
  4. ↑ Flexible, purposive SMW use , SMWCon Spring 2010, Clarence Dillon
  5. ^ History of the EVA Wiki , SMWCon Fall 2014, Daren Welsh, James Montalvo
  6. ↑ Alexander Gesinn, Michael Scherm: Social Collaboration "produces" human-machine communication. DOK.Magazin, accessed on November 8, 2017 .
  7. ↑ What makes an enterprise wiki ?. ( Memento of August 2, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) at: cmswatch.com , 4/2006.
  8. ↑ a b c d F. Mayer, D. Schoeneborn: WikiWebs in organizational communication. In: Ch. Stegbauer, MH Jäckel: Social Software. Forms of cooperation in computer-based networks. VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, Wiesbaden 2008, pp. 137–153.
  9. ^ T. Bartel: Use of wikis as knowledge management supporting systems in companies. Lecture on October 25, 2006 at KnowTech 2006, Munich.
  10. ↑ a b c d e J. S. Schmalz: Between cooperation and collaboration, between hierarchy and heterarchy. Organizational principles and structures of wikis. ( Memento of the original from December 23, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. In: communication @ society. 8/5, 2007. (accessed August 12, 2011) @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.soz.uni-frankfurt.de
  11. ↑ Alexander Gesinn: Semantic Wikis in Industry - 5 Use Cases . (No longer available online.) Gesinn.it GmbH & Co. KG, March 4, 2015, archived from the original on March 4, 2016 ; accessed on April 15, 2015 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.semantic-apps.com
  12. ↑ WikiMatrix statistics about compares and views of Wiki software
  13. ↑ K. Grzeganek, I. Frost, D. Gross: The agony of Wiki choice. Wikis for knowledge management in organizations, 2011.