I don’t have to know that! - Knowledge modeling and technical communication

When you write technical documentation, you manage a great deal of knowledge. Technical communicators evaluate and apply domain knowledge every day. For that, skills in knowledge modeling are extremely useful.

Text by Mark Schubert Sabine Stoye

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I don’t have to know that! - Knowledge modeling and technical communication

Image: Dmytro Tolokonov/123rf.com

I say hi and throw some coins in a small tray. The driver looks up, nods, and presses a few buttons. The small printer produces a piece of paper and the doors close behind me.

This probably sounds familiar to all who travel to work by bus. The driver knows exactly what I want, and I know what to do on the bus. Bus stop, bus schedule, bus, hop in, driver, ticket, hop out. All this is part of a bus ride. This kind of knowledge is ever-present. We don't talk much about it, but it helps us cope with everyday life. In knowledge management, this ever-present knowledge is called tacit knowledge. We acquire tacit knowledge by experiencing a similar situation repeatedly. It is not taught; it is neither written down nor verbalized. Therefore, tacit knowledge is hard to share. 

Implicit and explicit knowledge

Even though it’s not easy, we can try to write down and talk about our tacit knowledge. ...