Some have given the term WIKI the acronym of “What I Know Is”. Wiki is really derived from the Hawaiian work for ‘quick’. It is more than a buzzword; with reasonable participation, wikis can be effective and informative. Participants become part of the knowledge flow and support process sharing their knowledge with peers.
Wikis can grow company ideas, bring employees (and employers) together, and can develop content in support of company policy, process or product. Companies see benefit through empowering employees and garnering different perspectives on how the company works that may not otherwise be exposed. Companies can also identify those willing
and able to share their knowledge on aspects of the company. Quality wikis can also make work easier for management and users. Knowledge added to a wiki can be reused.
There are at least three main worker benefits to a good wiki implementation:
· Personal reputation and status within the corporation by making good contributions
· Simplifying business processes by sharing knowledge with others
· Contribute to overall business success through greater collaboration effectiveness
Some of the larger messaging and collaboration applications use the wiki format to maintain dynamic and relevant support content. For example, IBM has one for Lotus Notes and Domino, Microsoft maintains one for Exchange Server, and Yahoo! has one for Zimbra Collaboration Suite. For each of these products, the community can register, log on and contribute content based on their knowledge and experience - a sort of living help file. Contributors may add best practices, shortcuts or just helpful content on the products. Errors and misstatements may be corrected through peer-moderation or by site moderators.
Wikipedia is probably the best known wiki online and identifies both the benefits and concerns with user-contributed content. Moderation, whether through peers or by assigned moderator, needs to be prompt and effective for the wiki to retain relevance. There are many prepackaged enterprise wiki solutions available, such as Confluence and Brainkeeper, but there are also numerous products from hosted wikis, to open source solutions to custom applications. If you want to compare wiki applications, then the site WikiMatrix is a great resource.