Getting started with a wiki from scratch can be a daunting task- particularly if your organization has been sorely in need of a knowledge management and collaboration system for a long time. A shared drive that has as much out of date and inaccurate content as it has valuable information will ultimately result in a failed attempt at knowledge sharing- since no one knows what is worth looking at. Keeping everything in email can be even worse, as critical information is trapped on someone's PC, with no way for new employees or partners to access it. You might have a home-grown solution, created by people who don't know the first thing about how to manage information. You might have all or none of these, but when you realize that you need a better solution, and a wiki fits the bill, here are some tips on how to get your team started.
Communication
It is always a good idea to fully explain to everyone the benefits of a wiki, and how those benefits apply specifically to everyone. If you can give people a reason to contribute- then they will at least give it a chance. If you can convince them that their jobs will be easier, that they will ultimately be able to save time, or show exactly how they can work better with their co-workers, then you are almost assured that you will be able to build a solid foundation for your wiki.
Incentives
These can be as simple as incenting everyone on your team to add one new page and contribute to someone else's page each week. Or throw a pizza party if your team reaches a content goal of a specified number of pages. If all else fails and you are in management, you can also tie bonuses and performance evaluation scores to wiki contributions- though this is not something that we recommend. The more that people feel like they own the content, the more organic growth you will get, which is the key ingredient to a successful wiki.
Initiatives / Projects
Take a topic, an idea, or a difficult problem and challenge your team to solve it purely though wiki collaboration. This not only gets people familiar with the wiki, but it demonstrates the power of the tool, and you get a great resource at the end of the initiative. If you work on projects within your wiki, create a meeting agenda item to review various pages that you can create for Issues / Problems, Lessons Learned, or Status Updates. By bringing your laptop to the meeting and displaying the wiki for everyone to see, you get great participation and exposure.
Get Everyone Involved
There are always people in every team who are the recognized and respected leaders. Get these people to contribute, and you will see others follow suit. Also, if you can, get your Managers, Directors, and Executives to contribute. Even a comment here or there will let people know that upper management is paying attention, and thereby validating the content in the wiki.
There are a number of approaches for starting a wiki- and most are reasonable and will lead to success. The keys are: getting people to understand what a wiki can do for them as individuals as well as the company, providing concrete examples that show the value of the wiki, and getting the right people involved.
