‘when I first started, [the museum] had a paper manual, it was a ring binder that had all of the policies …, but also things like how to turn on the lights, where the light switches were, how to find things within the collection, and it covered a broad range of things and it was designed as a one stop shop, really. If someone had a question the hope was that the answer would be somewhere in this book. And I think that works … but … it became clear as we were doing more digital stuff that it wasn't possible to have everything on paper, because if you're working digitally and then trying to use something paper based, there was just a bit of a conflict there. I worked quite hard to make the paper manual work for the things that it could work for, and then put in place a similar structure, but an online version hosted on Google Drive, which is what the museum uses at the moment for digital file sharing, particularly because it enables us to share it with people who are not working on site.’ (Participant U4)

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User organisations are gradually utilising more online systems for their operations and transitioning from paper to digital formats that enable remote access, networking, and hybrid working. Additionally, user participants listed several support information platforms that are very useful, such as the Collections Trust, CultureHive, Knowledge Hub’s Heritage groups, cross-subject sites such as LinkedIn and YouTube, and internal sharing intranets such as SharePoint. However, they also pointed out that the use of technology is hampered by:

• the large number of often incompatible systems needed;

• their cost;

• need for excessively frequent upgrades; and

• lack of digital skills and equipment.

The lack of capacity, of processes, habits, and of systems to record operational knowledge on daily basis are mentioned by participants as factors for their organisations losing knowledge when people leave. Commercially provided systems are gradually offering more functions but are not affordable to most of the user organisations, especially when multiple software systems are needed. Many such systems are from different developers and do not share data readily amongst them. Several of these systems are still in early development for cultural heritage, with constant upgrades or bolt-on apps rather than complete systems, creating associated costs and training needs for each system or app, every time these are upgraded.

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‘In terms of written resources, mostly we use a Google Drive’ (Participant U5). Note the subtle distinction, ‘mostly’. This indicates the use of other storage systems for other formats, perhaps because of storage limit (see (Google support, 2024)). Internal knowledge artefacts are stored in different systems and different formats, potentially making it difficult to manage or find them. That is even before starting a search externally, to find knowledge artefacts across the web:

‘A front-end filtration system for us would be the most important thing … otherwise you can get lost in a wormhole and not find your way to the top layer.’

(Participant P13)

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So, even the support providers find website architecture challenging, ‘no one can find their way around their own websites, can they?’ (Participant P4). Structuring the provision of online content across the full breadth of a topic is a challenge (Participant P17). Knowledge information software then needs to be business-effective, and user friendly. There are so many support websites, each hosting a mixed bag of knowledge resources by organisations that themselves lack capacity or expertise to maintain them. This makes it very difficult for user organisations to find what they need, or to know whether the knowledge resource does exist. Participants mentioned that poor categorisation of the operations, insufficient search filtering, limited management of broken links, and irregular updating of content are further major barriers. Artificial Intelligence (AI) is increasingly being explored to help tackle such problems, particularly for search and to create knowledge artefacts:

‘I have been a very enthusiastic user of AI. I'm very dyslexic, so it's like my dream tool … I never again will write a health and safety policy … for me it's like a calculator for maths … There's a whole new way of accessing information, whether that information is accurate, is yet another can of worms, but it is so much easier than the Internet because it's a filter.’ (Participant P15)

The potential and concerns on the use of AI for the knowledge design are explored in the AI feature. The participants’ insights for a knowledge design follow next.