Many of the workflow maps revealed issues known well to Aquino, but others revealed surprises. The six workgroups within AARS—Human Resources, Accounting, San Mateo Branch, Santa Clara Branch, IT, and Grants—each had their own particular workflow, but it was apparent that they all needed a way to manage their documentation, as well as a file structure for archiving that data. In addition, it was found that they needed some way to share information with the larger organization, for capturing best practices and gaining access to internal operations reports. They needed a way to post information for grant writers working remotely and to make personal notes more useful and actionable. They also needed an easy way to update their website and to assess and research IT issues.

Insight

Ricoh quickly noted that there was no way the IT staff could support the creation and layout of web pages tuned to the workflow of each workgroup. Instead, a wiki solution was proposed, which would allow each group to create their own structure, without IT intervention. A wiki is a page or collection of Web pages designed to enable anyone who accesses it to contribute or modify content, using a simplified markup language. Wikis are often used to create collaborative websites and to provide intranets and Knowledge Management systems to businesses. Furthermore, many wikis were open-source and far less expensive than a Microsoft solution.

Aquino presented an overview of wikis at a senior staff meeting and immediately a fellow staff member chimed in with an application idea: posting board minutes. Another saw the potential for the wiki to house the large number of documents and notes required to complete a grant application. The Development Officer in charge of the grant writing process was eager to try a wiki-based web solution to his document management woes.

Although enthusiastic about the potential of a wiki-based knowledge management system, the Development Officer wanted to limit access to some grant information, so that both the contract writers and the branch managers would not be distracted by unimportant details. He joined the Ricoh/AARS project team, and quickly became an active participant in co-designing a solution that would work for his department. By talking through each of his main concerns, the team was able to iterate on their design so it would be both realistic to deploy, easy to manage, and still meet the needs of the user community.