The FAQ - revisited

How can the humble FAQ contribute to leaning, decisions and knowledge sharing?

FAQs can be gathered (mined) and represented in many ways. One way gaining in popularity is to have a FAQ option or tag when closing a service or helpdesk ticket. There is an increasing focus on FAQs to enable web-based self-help thus reducing calls to the helpdesk.

FAQs share many characteristics with patterns & canned helpdesk answers - proven effective solutions to common problems, steps and actions to be taken, 'see also' links to related issues. Good FAQs provide a learning experience and ways to quickly confirm the 'diagnosis' upfront.

Example of a comprehensive FAQ: http://www.htmlhelp.com/faq/html/all.html

Best practices for self-help: http://www.destinationcrm.com/articles/default.asp?ArticleID=4369

Thoughts & enhancements

• Allow RSS subscription
• Enable feedback - to collect context and examples where the script does not work
• Include pointers to experts and decision trees (for more complex problems)
  
• Have background graphics & text - i.e. 'learn more' tab, training, expert services, see pics
  
• Think about workflow and escalation - where to go if the answer does not work?

Examples of FAQs about KM

http://www.sveiby.com/faq.html

http://www.ebizwebpages.com/qwtinc/km_faq

http://knowledgemanagement.ittoolbox.com/DOCUMENTS/default.asp?Section=FAQs

http://choo.fis.utoronto.ca/KMfaq/

Q&A about KM

http://www2.cio.com/ask/category.cfm?CATEGORY=18&Go=Go

http://www.askmecorp.com/product/default.asp  - a FAQ ecology?

 

 

Comments

[Alan Levine]

I've been an IT developer for 10+ years and can recall perhaps on one hand the number of times I have found an answer in a FAQ. Maybe I Q things that are not FA, but they generally appear to be written more for the people who created an item (who guess what people might Q) than from those that use it.

Hi Alan,

My experience with FAQs has been collecting the most effective answers to users questions. In this instance, it is the questions that drive the solutions not the people who write them.

Further thoughts?