LearnTech Implements Knowledge-Centered Service Approach to Enhance Self-Service Offerings

Over the past year, the Instructional Technology Support (IST) team has been working to revamp its process for creating and publishing knowledge articles within the DELTA LearnTech Knowledge Base. The primary goal of this project has been to improve the ability to provide quality self-service support resources for faculty and staff in a timely manner, while ensuring the best quality content possible. 

As part of this project, members of the DELTA LearnTech Help Desk team went through training in early 2022 to learn more about the Knowledge-Centered Service (KCS) methodology, and how that could be applied to the current article creation process. This helped shift the focus toward capturing the individual knowledge and day-to-day experiences of the LearnTech team, and transitioning that into valuable self-service resources. 

The LearnTech team completed both the KCS v6 Fundamentals self-paced course as well as an instructor-led KCS v6 Practices Workshop to learn more about the KCS methodology and improve their current knowledge management business processes. Since these initial training sessions, LearnTech has implemented a demand-driven approach to their knowledge article creation process. The various requests LearnTech receives and responds to daily, and the solutions provided to our faculty and staff, assist in directly identifying new knowledge that should be added to our Knowledge Base. 

If a self-service resource does not exist, or the current resource is outdated, the resolution for that particular faculty or staff member becomes the foundation for a new or updated article. It’s these daily interactions and the sharing of knowledge that is driving the overall growth and enhancement of our Knowledge Base, making it that much more valuable for other users across campus.

There has been an increased effort to identify and capture knowledge directly within DELTA as well. By implementing a new KCS channel in our DELTA Slack workspace, there is now direct visibility across DELTA units regarding new and updated content within our Knowledge Base. This helps to further promote and communicate those resources with the NC State community. 

The Slack channel has also provided a mechanism for those outside of LearnTech to share and request self-service resources be added to our Knowledge Base.The increased ability for any member of DELTA to have an impact on the Knowledge Base is a direct result of the KCS methodology, and further enhances our reach and impact when it comes to support resources.

Moving forward, the IST team plans to continue evolving its practices around Knowledge management using KCS. Though there have been positive impacts and improved usage of the Knowledge Base already, the overall project is still in its early stages. Faculty and staff can find all the latest self-service resources related to DELTA technologies at go.ncsu.edu/learntech. For specific assistance with a DELTA tool, you can reach out to the LearnTech helpdesk at learntech@ncsu.edu.