Documentation Tools
No one knows the answer better than those closest to the problem.
Every organization develops knowledge that rarely appears in an instruction manual. Employees learn how work actually gets done, which steps matter, what exceptions occur, where information is located, and how to solve problems that only experience reveals. Collectively, those people become an organization’s brain trust.
The problem is that much of this knowledge exists only in people’s heads.
When an experienced employee retires, leaves the organization, changes responsibilities, or simply isn’t available, years of accumulated knowledge can suddenly become difficult to recover. PCS Documentation Tools provides a practical framework for capturing that knowledge while it is still available and organizing it so other people can actually use it.
Effective documentation can preserve:
• Business processes and workflows
• Step-by-step operating procedures
• Employee knowledge and experience
• Screens, applications, and software procedures
• Technical configurations and important reference information
• Training material for current and future employees
• Solutions to unusual problems and exceptions
• Institutional knowledge that might otherwise leave with an individual
The objective isn’t documentation for its own sake. It is to create an organizational memory that becomes more valuable as knowledge is added to it.
Building an Organizational Memory
The demonstration above shows the notebook model PCS developed around Microsoft OneNote. Instead of forcing every piece of knowledge into one enormous document, information can be organized into notebooks, sections, pages, and supporting material that reflect the way the organization actually operates.
The people performing the work can participate directly in documenting it. A procedure can begin as notes, screenshots, photographs, a screen recording, spoken explanation, existing document, or other information captured while someone who understands the process is actually performing it.
PCS uses complementary tools where they make the documentation easier to create and understand:
• Microsoft OneNote provides the organizational framework for collecting and navigating information.
• Snagit captures screens, images, annotations, and step-by-step visual information.
• Camtasia records and explains processes that are easier to demonstrate than describe.
• Audiate helps transform spoken explanations into editable and reusable information.
The tools are not the methodology. They make the methodology practical. The real objective is to make it easy for people closest to the work to capture what they know and place that knowledge into a structure other people can understand.
PCS Became the Case Study
Patriot Computer Solutions didn’t develop this framework only as something to recommend to customers. PCS used the methodology to document its own business.
The PCS business process was organized using the OneNote framework, capturing the knowledge, procedures, philosophy, and experience accumulated through operating the company. The Full Case Study demonstration above shows how documentation can grow beyond individual instructions into a structured representation of how an organization actually works.
That work ultimately became the foundation for Wisdom Cries Out in the Street by Phillip R. Taylor, a book documenting the PCS business process and the knowledge developed through years of operating the company.
That experience demonstrated an important principle: institutional knowledge does not have to disappear when circumstances or people change. Knowledge that is identified, captured, organized, and maintained becomes an asset the organization can continue to use.
Start With the People Who Know
A documentation project doesn’t have to begin with someone trying to write an enormous company manual. It can begin with the people already doing the work.
Capture the process. Record the explanation. Save the screen. Document the exception. Organize the information. Then continue improving it as the organization learns.
Over time, individual pieces of information become procedures, procedures become a knowledge base, and the knowledge base becomes part of the organization’s operational memory.
PCS helps businesses throughout Roseville, Rocklin, Lincoln, Granite Bay, and surrounding communities develop practical documentation systems based on the same principles used to document PCS itself. Your organization’s accumulated knowledge is an asset. The objective of documentation is to make sure that knowledge belongs to the organization—not merely to the person who happens to know it today.