Knowledge article template variations - what are you experiences?

[Magnus Hovik]

Sorry about the long read!

Note: I'm mostly curious to hear thoughts and experiences from your organisation — don't get too hung up on the specifics of our setup! 🙂

(And hopefully don't just answer that we need better content approval)

We're evaluating whether to expand beyond a single KCS template. Some context:

• Large organisation, multiple departments (IT, HR, Marketing, Finance, etc.)
• Early KCS adoption — CoE, knowledge coaches, delegated contributors, no content approval team
• Current single template (Title – Description – Resolution) feels IT-centric, losing non-IT contributors
• A "Standard" template sits alongside it — non-IT newcomers tend to default to it instinctively
• Knowledge flows both reactively and proactively — not all knowledge is demand-driven
• We are going to test variations internally based on lots of existing knowledge and tickets from different departments.

We're considering adding: 

• Problem & Solution
• Question & Answer
• How To

But I'm concerned about overlap and decision fatigue, especially without a content team to catch inconsistencies. Here's the problem illustrated. The same topic, three valid templates:

IT example — "Reset my password"

• Q&A:
  • Question: How do I reset my password?
  • Answer: Go to the login page and click "Forgot password"
• How To:
  • Introduction: This guide explains how to reset your password
  • Instructions: Step 1, Step 2...
• Problem & Solution:
  • Problem: User cannot log in due to forgotten password
  • Solution: Navigate to...

HR example — "Missing paycheck"

• Q&A:
  • Question: Why haven't I received my paycheck?
  • Answer: Contact payroll at X with your employee ID
• How To:
  • Introduction: This guide explains what to do if your paycheck is missing
  • Instructions: Step 1, Step 2...
• Problem & Solution:
  • Problem: Employee has not received expected paycheck
  • Solution: Navigate to the payroll portal...

A contributor sitting down to write either of these has to make a judgment call. And in a large, (mostly) self-regulated program, three people could write the same article three different ways. Good content standards help — but realistically, people won't consult them every time.

This gets even more interesting for proactive knowledge. Organisational content that isn't tied to a specific incident or request. That content often doesn't fit neatly into any of these templates either?

I know KCS leans toward a single template, and I understand the reasoning. We've tried it, it's not landing across our departments, and I don't think more training alone will fix it.

What are your experiences? Or thoughts?

Thank you!

[owenbarber]

From our experience I would not stray from the OOB templates (FAQ, How To, What Is, KCS Article, and Standard).  

We used to have a few more custom ones and this becomes quite an overhead to maintain whilst bringing more tables which becomes an issue for filtering and reporting on.  

Personally for the articles staying on SNOW I see no massive issue upon which of the standard templates is chosen the real benefit for me is when you want articles to appear a set way on Portals.  FAQ is perfect for your HR, Finance and Marketing Q&A's.  How to more for your simple processes, What is for your informational pieces and policies. 

Agreed the KCS template is super IT focused but is perfect for that world especially when creating from Tickets.

Standard is always the most used as its a blank canvas but I prefer the other four for the SEO benefits if the 1st fields are used well.