Best practices for a Enterprise knowledge base

[Patrice Champet]

Hello,

We have a huge knowledge base on Confluence for all the application in our company.
This one was working fine on our Confluence on Premise .

Moving to the cloud, it appears that there is more restrictions and performances issues for maintenability. (bulk edit labels, restricted automation, etc...)

This KB is not linked to JSM right now.

I wonder if, on cloud, a best practice could be to split this single space in differents spaces, by functional domain, or application.

How do you work on KB in your company?
One single space, different spaces... What the pro/cons for you ?

 Thanks for your feedback.

[Shawn Doyle - ReleaseTEAM · Accepted solution]

I like to promote multiple spaces.  Not just for the division and collection of information, but for permissions.  I would rather manage Space permissions than page restrictions.

[Kristian Klima · Accepted solution]

Hi @Patrice Champet 

I'd like to think of content in terms of both the content management (on the content creation site) and content consumption (how people read it). These are two sides of the same coin and my answer is going to reflect this.

I'd argue it depends on the following:

• is your KB internal or public?
• is Confluence the place for both the content creation and content consumption?
• how interconnected are your products?
• what is your workflow and 'editorial/approval' process?

For example, for our product (documented here: https://docs.emplifi.io/ in Confluence and built int a website using Scroll Viewport app) we went with a single space as the individual modules are interconnected.

For intranet, however, it might make sense to go with individual spaces for individual departments - precisely because of permission and content governance.

Then it's a question of how do you want to present your content and how do you want the readers to 'consume' it.

Going the way of individual spaces and with your users accessing your KB via Confluence, you're risking atomizing the content for them. With the single space approach, you're making it overwhelming and hard to manage (content, user, permission-wise).

If your KB is extensive, I would go for a multi-space approach for better management. Then you might consider using an app to create a single documentation site that would act as a gateway to the docs for individual products - like Atlassian docs :) built with the app referenced above, but there are many others on the marketplace.

This approach would allow for most flexibility (again, permissions, workflows, content management) on your end, while giving the readers (internal or external) to access docs for individual apps, without clutter, while giving the option to move across the apps docs within a unified controlled environment (that is nicer to interact with than stock Confluence).

Hope this will help to evaluate your options.

[Zoriana Bogutska_Adaptavist_]

Hi @Patrice Champet 

Content Formatting Macros for the Confluence app provides features that will help you structure, organise, and improve the look and feel of content, such as tabs, cards and expanding (with advanced branding customisation), buttons, interactive banner/image sliders, etc. 

More than that you can use templates this app provides for a variety of use cases including for Knowledge base

I would be happy to share more info if needed as a team member of the vendor that developed this app. 

[Anna Mitina _Stiltsoft_]

Hi @Patrice Champet ,

In case you provide training based on your KB, having an LMS in the same system would be an advantage.

We have an app called IZI for Confluence (LMS, Training Courses, Quizzes). Our add-on allows to create trainings (including onboarding courses and quizzes) inside Confluence, using existing Confluence pages.

So if you're managing employee development IZI would be a great help! Feel free to let me know if you have any questions :)

[Daniel_Domene_Kolekti]

Hi @Patrice Champet , it could vary on the number of users in your instance but, as @Shawn Doyle - ReleaseTEAM recommended, we also go for multiple spaces.

Normally a space per department within the company, etc. Easier to set and manage permissions too.

We have some articles about setting up your first Cloud Knowledge Base that might be interesting, I'll point out to a few if you want to read a bit more:

- Articles on Confluence Knowledge Management
- How to create a Confluence knowledge base: our 6-step guide
- Confluence for enterprise collaboration: the ultimate guide

I hope this helps! Feel free to reach out if you need more guidance :)