Are 2.0 heads better than 1.0?

People are at the centre of the success of the wiki. Wikis grow with the enthusiasm of their contributors. Whatever the shape of your organisation, wikis are here to stay, improving communication and creating opportunities for discussion.

Wikis adapt to suit all cultures. Some organisations benefit from several wikis, giving each sub-culture a portal for its individual activity. Businesses with a more diverse infrastructure benefit from a closely marshalled wiki system with increased trackability.

As an example of how wikis can work within an organisation, let’s look at Epic’s internal wiki, set up in Spring 2005.

Case study: the Epic internal wiki

The Epic wiki was set up as a way of sharing knowledge between programmers. It has since grown to encompass sections for Design, Graphic, Web and Project Management.

At Epic, the wiki is a tool to refine philosophies, discuss industry developments and to post articles on trends. It provides an immediate solution for sharing lessons learned and best practice. The Epic wiki homepage displays daily news feeds from across the e-learning industry, helping us stay one step ahead of the competition.

However, it’s the wiki’s latest hot topic that’s creating the most attention. Once a year, a number of Epic’s junior designers study for Sussex University’s PG Cert in e-learning. For these students, the wiki is now evolving into a knowledge portal, providing a place for them to exchange ideas at their own pace and openly discuss their findings. The wiki is becoming a powerful, freestyle learning system.

Inspired by the success of its internal wiki as an educational tool, Epic is now investigating using a similar model to launch an external version for the use of clients, partners, researchers and all involved in championing e-learning in their organisations.

So can wikis make a difference to your business?

In Epic’s opinion, people are at the heart of the Wiki's success and there's a two-way correlation between this success and the enthusiasm and passion of the contributors. Whatever the shape of your organisation, Wikis will definitely help you, creating opportunities for informed discussion, creating a 'buzz' and improving communication generally.

"User-generated content will become more acceptable, and we will therefore see more use of blogs and wikis in the workplace."
Jane Hart, the Jane Hart Consultancy