How to Handle a Global Business with the Help of a Knowledge Base?

Knowledge management is a very powerful process that brings a lot of benefits and creates numerous opportunities for a global business. Global organizations look at knowledge management as a process, an operation within the boundaries of their KM strategy. The main goal is achieving smooth knowledge transfer that happens not only within the organization’s boundaries, but also outside of it.

In the past, implementing a KM strategy was quite difficult, but today, with access to a cloud-based knowledge base, global organizations can tap into its powers with no limits. Since managing a global business presents many challenges, we have decided to let you in into how to handle it with the help of a knowledge base.

 

Global Business Functions

One business organization consists of several departments, also referred to as functions. These functions are very important, and appreciating the purpose and activities of each of these functions is extremely important when an organization is operating as a global enterprise.

When it comes to a typical global business organization, its functions go as follows:

• Accounting and Finance
• Production
• Purchasing
• Marketing and Selling
• Human Resource Management
• R&D (Research and Development)

It is important to note that in the global business model these departments can be scattered all around the globe and an organization can have one department in multiple locations such as Apple’s headquarters are located in Cupertino, California, United States, but the production of components is handled by companies around the globe and the assembly line is located in China.

Product and Service Quality

The main goal of a global business is to increase production, decrease production costs and successfully sell the products on the market. In order to stay successful, such a business has to provide the same product and/or service quality no matter where it is manufactured, and assembled, or in case of a service, provided.

Cloud-based knowledge base software is an increasingly important asset in the global business model. This is simply because it allows easy knowledge distribution to the entire work force. All the information is located on an online server and it can be accessed from anywhere around the globe. Besides, some of the vendors offer cloud knowledge base software as a mobile-friendly solution, which allows access via any device.

Lower Training Costs

Global organizations have very big training expenses. The legacy training methods are usually instructor-based, and they usually last longer and during them the workforce spends their paid time to learn new skills and information. So an organization has triple expenses, it pays the instructor, invests in the course and training materials and provides a salary for workers who are not producing anything.

During the training period ROI drops down to minimal values. Fortunately, there is way to shorten this period of training and improve the onboarding process of a new workforce. By using service cloud knowledge base software this can be accomplished and the entire process can be streamlined.

And what is more important, you don’t have to create new articles to share them with new hires. If your KB is only for internal purposes, you can create new users, assign them privilege rights and invite new employees to get on board and become part of an existing learning and knowledge sharing culture.

Better Customer Support

Keeping customers happy and satisfied with products and services is extremely important. Global corporations pay extra attention to this aspect of their business since they have to penetrate foreign markets and compete with organizations that have already established their presence.

Beside standard customer support methods, such as having a customer support centre and live chat on the official website, a knowledge base can provide excellent customer support service. Cloud-based knowledge base can be published on the official website to serve as self-service help centre.

By extending a helping hand in this manner and allowing new customers to find the needed information on their own, global businesses raise the bar in term of customer support service. Besides, by allowing customers to find answers on their own, organizations also experience increased ticket deflection and reduced customer support department costs. Knowledge base software is extremely convenient for this purpose, because it supports localization, so that customers can look for information in their own language.

Take a look how simple and well-designed FAQ page of Red Bull provides all the necessary information for their customers.

Regulatory Compliance

Regulatory compliance is also one of the global business model aspects that should not be neglected. In the past, we have seen that noncompliance not only ruins corporate reputations, but it also destroys careers and shatters financial performance. This is why risk of noncompliance is a topic that is always under the magnifying glass of any global corporation.

Regulatory compliance may become a problem because of the nature of a global business. Products are made all across the globe, they are assembled in another location, and sold across the globe. And we know that in every country different tax, employment, data protection, product safety, fair competition and export control laws apply.

In order to deflect some of the regulatory pressure, organizations use an internal knowledge base and wiki and constantly update them with new laws and regulations that have to be abided. By keeping the workforce updated with the latest rules, corporations avoid expensive lawsuits that may cripple their production.

As you can see, cloud-based knowledge base software makes handling a global business more reliable. By implementing a knowledge sharing culture, global organizations not only protect themselves from lawsuits, but also increase productivity, collaboration and employee engagement.

As knowledge base content can be published externally in the form of a self-service help centre, organizations also benefit from educating their business partners and customers.