Examining the knowledge artefact in the Socialization mode can help to evaluate the pollination of knowledge in the cultural heritage sites and across the ecosystem. The main enablers for the Socialization mode are trust and commitment. Trust in the Socialization mode relates to i) trusted interactions within the people of the organisation, ii) trust within the networks, and iii) trust between provider organisations. Commitment can also be assessed at i) personal level ii) organisational level as commitment to professional development, and iii) ecosystem level as commitment to quality knowledge accumulation. Lack of commitment can be seen as loss of memory and skills, and loss of cultural and heritage value, a devaluation of the ecosystem.

Knowledge artefacts enable the accumulation and internalization of the organi-sational memory. They are perceived positively in cultural heritage as they provide confidence, direction, and enable personal development (concept pilot interviews, in-terviews). Knowledge artefacts are useful to share best practice and by keeping them simple they are easier to adapt to their new site (concept pilot interviews, methodolo-gy pilot interview, interviews). However, especially in a competitive and stressed eco-system, it is understandable that some people hold back knowledge to safeguard their positions (concept pilot interviews, interviews). 

Two characteristics make knowledge artefacts more useful in socializing expe-riential knowledge in cultural heritage, i) being integral to continued professional de-velopment (interviews), and ii) being part of a proactive knowledge resources pack-age, which includes access to specialist support (abductive examination). The scope of socialization, however, is limited. There was an appreciation of overlapping opera-tions and common objectives, but participants felt they were in separate competing sectors, rather than belonging to an overarching unified ecosystem (concept pilot in-terviews, interviews, abductive investigation). Participants were aware that individual organisations were integral parts of broader systems and that there was an opportuni-ty to learn from others, particularly from larger organisations (concept pilot interviews, interviews). However, policy, financial pressures, and competition for resources, have driven divisions, leading to cultural heritage habitats being operationally disjointed, limiting the reach and scope of knowledge artefacts (literature, methodology pilot in-terview, abductive examination).

The financial pressures have also built up a membership wall in knowledge provision, with paid membership fostering exclusive clubs rather than inclusive knowledge sharing (literature). Compared to all demographic types examined, memberships had the highest positive relation to Economic development performance, and significant relation to the intangible objectives. This, however, might just be tautology; organisations that can afford to pay memberships are financially better off, irrespectively of the membership benefits. On the other hand, easy access and free membership related to more equal increases across all four objectives (questionnaires). Considering the lack of visibility to non-members of what knowledge artefacts a membership includes, people appear to join as members for the network-ing support, not for the access to unknown quality or levels of knowledge artefacts. The membership organisations’ strategy of churning out high volumes, of often rushed and quickly out of date, knowledge artefacts to attract members, seems to be unsubstantiated; membership organisations with limited capacity should instead be focusing on developing high quality continued professional development training packages to accompany their supportive networking provision. This quality socializa-tion is what members value (interviews) and would be a better strategy to increase their membership. 

Formal schemes and networks had a significant positive association with the processes around knowledge artefacts and with organisational performance. Accredi-tation schemes triggered the creation and updating of knowledge artefacts (concept pilot interviews, methodology pilot interview, interviews) but its positive influence was neutralized in all participating countries and sites with tight parent organisation-child site control (questionnaires). A more approachable, open, and user-friendly accredita-tion interface (even if the content is bureaucratically heavy) related to higher knowledge uptake. High quality accreditation knowledge resources, accessibility to those, and intensity of supportive structure, amplified the performance (question-naires, abductive examination). Having the leading user organisation of the habitat, assigned to the management of the accreditation scheme (such as the Archives ac-creditation in the UK, and the Museum accreditation in New Zealand) made the schemes more effective (questionnaires, abductive examination). In the UK, connect-ing the accreditation scheme with high quality and accessible knowledge artefacts (as in the partnership with the Collections Trust), supported by training and access to ex-perts (as provided by the Museum Development regional teams and other support organisations) has positively impacted the whole Environmental development objec-tive. And targeting specific demographic categories within the scheme, such as local museums, has had a significant positive impact for them (questionnaires). But such comprehensive infrastructure as for managing collections is not found for the other two accreditation-related headings, organisational health and user experience (abductive examination, questionnaires). Different high-quality schemes do exist that have positive relation on the other objectives, such as the Education awards (intangible objectives), the Visitor Awards (socio-economic objectives), and the Other awards (mainly across the intangible objectives but also on Economic development) but their knowledge resources provision is not joined-up with a high-profile programme such as the accreditation scheme (literature, questionnaires, abductive examination).  

Equally, there are extensive professional networks creating alliances with commercial providers, bringing in missing technical skills, but their knowledge re-sources are not socializing with the other schemes, especially accreditation. Similarly, there are excellent provider organisations with extensive training programmes and professional development elements, but the funding, planning, and creation of their knowledge resources are not cohesive, nor do they create a complete professional development package (interviews, abductive examination). The hosting of knowledge resources is equally fragmented, making search for knowledge resources ineffective. The fragmentation makes a provision of knowledge resources (training, expert sup-port, and knowledge artefacts) full of gaps, duplications, and uncoordinated use of funding for them (literature, interviews, questionnaires, abductive investigation). The provision limitations are reflected in the restrained organisational sustainability per-formance of user organisations (questionnaires).

A wide range of support networks rely on small teams of experts (interviews, abductive examination). Alongside the high risk of knowledge loss when these people leave a role, it is important to consider structured development provision for the ex-perts, whether they are in a specific provider organisation, or the extensive, vulnera-ble, number of freelancers who cannot afford the costs of memberships as means of personal development (literature, abductive investigation). The ecosystem needs a professional development train-the-trainer package of knowledge resources for all the objectives and operations, and a comprehensive infrastructure to deliver professional development to the user organisations.

So, instead of thinking of personal knowledge, user-organisation knowledge, provider-organisation knowledge, or sectorial knowledge, we can commit to cultural heritage professional development knowledge. What knowledge does any individual need to join the ecosystem, to settle in, to continue developing professionally, and to help others learn from their experience? What knowledge do people need whether they join in as volunteers, apprentices, from university, from other ecosystems, and as they develop, work as independent freelancers, or move across roles and different organisations (with common public-good objectives and common operations). If individuals have access to knowledge they need, and they can build their personal professional development library, they will not hoard or hide organisational knowledge. If there is an ecosystem commitment to a live library of cultural heritage professional knowledge, the individual and organisational barriers to trust can break down.    

Breaking the trust barriers then starts with leadership commitment, and would enhance the socialization of experiential knowledge. Professional development re-quires quality training joined up with training materials. We have seen that such socialization is negatively affected by short-lived networking programmes (literature, interviews, abductive investigation). Training and workshops are not providing long-term support, and crucially they do not contribute to updated knowledge. Even if such activity produces knowledge artefacts, once a project ends those are often lost once a website is no longer maintained, or go out of date with no one to review them. Users then end up lost out in sea, with a fog of out-of-date information making their knowledge search and selection harder. In an ecosystem-wide design, the role of provider organisations, therefore, takes a different purpose, they become leaders in the commitment, an alliance of lighthouses. Rather than competing for funds to provide ad-hoc, reactive knowledge resources, they could be funded (same pot of money) to lead a joined up professional development package for each of the four objectives, and each of their operational areas (drums) or sub-operations (flutes) (or equiva-lent ones). Each of those operational areas could have a coordinated feedback process, and a plan for addressing gaps and needs, all informing the funding priorities; enabling funders to know how much and when each objective, drum, or flute, will need more funding. The provision commitment then becomes two-way; enabling commitment by provider organisations to an ecosystem knowledge design also be-comes a longer-term, more secure, funding environment for these provider organisations. 

There would likely be resistance to the design by provider organisations who might understandably fear they would be destabilised, lose out, or even close be-cause of it. The numbers of provider organisations (and freelancers) increased while user organisations have been cutting-back or closing. Improving the knowledge re-sources, and therefore organisational performance across the ecosystem, would enable user organisations to reemploy and bring expertise and capacity in house. This would potentially create a natural reduction or consolidation of provider organisations (and freelancers) over time, easing off the competition. Additionally, provision across specific drums would not only reduce duplications of knowledge resources but also overlapping of provider organisations. Funders would be able to avoid funding over-laps of expert organisations, again ensuring that provider organisations with specific knowledge curating remits are more stable over the long term. It would allow provider organisations to develop their expertise in specific operations and to demonstrate the positive impact of their knowledge curating work. The knowledge curating design then also requires making a commitment, to set a principle that it would be governed and operated in a way that avoids harming provision organisations by its application.

A professional development approach in operational knowledge curation, would reach organisations that are network-shy or not accreditation-ready. Most museums, and many organisations in other habitats, are not accredited or formal members of knowledge sharing networks. Ongoing access to professional knowledge by individu-als could be a starting socializing point for their organisations to engage with the eco-system. Additionally, there is one more source of knowledge that has great potential to contribute to knowledge socializing: the (increasingly under-funded) local authori-ties. Their knowledge resources are created through public funds, and local authori-ties are exactly that, local, covering every county. They have templates for operations such as human resources, risk assessments, safeguarding and equality policies, and so on, that small cultural heritage organisations are thirsty for. We have seen that the parent-child relation of local authority-managed cultural heritage sites restricts the ab-sorption of accreditation and other similar ecosystem-specific knowledge resources. But we have also seen one alternative relation that thrives. In the abductive investiga-tion (chapter 7) one governance partnership showed much above average high vol-umes of present (95.00%) and updated knowledge artefacts (53.33%), and high per-formance (68.75%). The governance set up site was reverse to the usual partner-ships; the building and collection were owned by a charity, and managed by the local authority. Such a partnership produced high levels of knowledge artefacts and per-formance (deductive analysis and abductive examination). The role of local authorities therefore ought to be considered within the knowledge curating design as a beneficial provider of non-cultural heritage knowledge resources to cultural heritage organisa-tions at each local area; enriching the knowledge artefacts of county-wide knowledge curating networks. Such approach would again utilise existing resources and raise the profile and role of local authorities in improving their county’s cultural heritage without (necessarily) having to manage sites themselves.