Key Points
- Knowledge management systems can support employees, customers, support agents, and other audiences.
- Common examples include employee intranets, internal knowledge bases, IT self-service portals, and customer self-service portals.
- Effective knowledge management makes information easier to find, maintain, govern, and use, rather than simply storing it in a centralized repository.
- Genworth, Materion, Airbus, and Broadcom demonstrate how organizations can adapt knowledge management to different business needs.
- Search, self-service, personalization, permissions, and integration are among the most important capabilities for creating useful knowledge experiences.
Introduction
If your employees, customers, or support teams struggle to find the information they need, the problem may not be a lack of knowledge. More often, it’s how that knowledge is organized, delivered, and kept up to date. Outdated information scattered across disconnected tools leads to user frustration, more support tickets, and a lot of wasted time.
A knowledge management system can bring information into the intranets, portals, and self-service experiences people already use. The following knowledge management system examples, drawn from leading companies across several industries, show what that looks like in practice and the value it can create.
What Is a Knowledge Management System?
A knowledge management system helps organizations capture, organize, maintain, and share information so employees, customers, and other users can find answers when they need them. At its best, it supports the full KM process, from knowledge creation to knowledge transfer and continuous improvement.
Depending on the use case, that might take the form of an employee intranet, an internal knowledge base, an IT support portal, or a customer help center. A knowledge base may be one part of that system, while knowledge management covers the broader processes and technology used to keep information useful, governed, and accessible.
That knowledge base also serves an important protective role. When employees change roles or leave the organization, a well-maintained knowledge base keeps their expertise from leaving with them, preserving organizational knowledge through turnover.
4 Real-World Knowledge Management System Examples
Knowledge management can look very different depending on who needs the information and what they need to accomplish with it. That’s why real-world case studies are often more useful than definitions.
For IT, digital workplace, knowledge management, and customer experience teams, the following examples illustrate how enterprises have used Liferay DXP to address various information access and self-service challenges. Together, they’re among the best examples of how a single knowledge management tool can adapt to very different user needs.
1. Genworth: An Employee Intranet and Customer Service Knowledge Base
If you’re trying to support multiple departments, communities, and knowledge needs with a single digital workplace, Genworth offers a useful model.
Its previous intranet had become difficult to update and functioned more like a static newsletter than a modern employee resource. Genworth rebuilt the experience with Liferay DXP, ultimately supporting between 700 and 800 sites on a single platform.
Today, those sites serve several purposes:
- Employee communications. The intranet acts as a central hub for communications and resources.
- Collaboration. Internal communities give teams and groups a place to exchange information, publish content, and participate in discussions.
- Customer service. Representatives can use the portal as a self-service knowledge base to access relevant information and solve issues on behalf of customers.
- Content control. Permissions, roles, content management, and collaboration tools support different audiences within the same environment.
Bringing these functions together also allowed Genworth to consolidate roughly 800 sites, rather than treating each knowledge-sharing need as a standalone project.
What can we learn from Genworth? If your organization manages separate employee sites, team spaces, and support resources, a knowledge management system can bring those experiences together without forcing every audience into the same workflow.
Read the case study
2. Materion: An Employee Knowledge Hub for a Global Workforce
When employees know information exists but still resort to email, a quick message, or a Google Meet call with a colleague to find it, the problem is often discoverability rather than content. This is a widespread problem. Nearly two-thirds of KM and IT leaders surveyed by APQC say employees' inability to find information is a significant drain on productivity.
That was part of the challenge facing Materion, a global supplier of advanced materials with 2,600 employees. The company relied heavily on email, and employees struggled to find policies, standards, and other important guidelines. Its existing intranet was also difficult to navigate and wasn’t seeing the level of adoption the company wanted.
Materion redesigned its employee intranet, called “Materion Matters,” around how employees actually interact with company information. Workers gained easier access to resources such as:
- Company policies and standards
- Reference guides and job aids
- Employee directory information
- Corporate news
- Other critical internal content
The redesign also emphasized navigation and findability so employees could get to what they needed without digging through emails or disconnected resources. A predictable layout like this is especially helpful for new employees, who don’t yet know where anything lives.
The result? Materion reported an 18% year-over-year increase in sessions and a 47% increase in page views.
What can we learn from Materion? For digital workplace and internal communications teams, especially in organizations with global reach, centralizing content is only part of the job. Employees also need a clear, intuitive experience that makes finding information easier than falling back on old habits.
Read the case study
3. Airbus: An IT Self-Service Knowledge Management System
For IT leaders, one of the clearest opportunities for knowledge management is reducing the number of common queries that reach the Service Desk.
Airbus wanted to consolidate approximately 15 IT service management tools into a single solution and reduce users' dependence on the Service Desk for everyday IT needs.
Using Liferay DXP, Airbus created an IT self-service support portal for 100,000 users. Rather than separating knowledge from incident management, the portal brings several functions into one place:
- Knowledge base. Users can search for articles by keyword, then like, comment on, or share them.
- Incident management. More than 300 ready-to-use templates help users create, update, and track incidents.
- Request tracking. Employees can follow requests for equipment, applications, and other services.
- Equipment information. Users can view their assigned devices.
- Service alerts. Notifications can keep employees informed about problems with services they use.
This gives employees a chance to find answers themselves before turning to IT support.
The results were significant. The portal recorded 290,000 visits and 2.2 million page views in its first 10 months, and Airbus reported that the Service Desk was managing 30% fewer incidents.
What can we learn from Airbus? If your goal is to increase IT self-service, knowledge is most useful when it appears in the same experience where users are already trying to solve a problem.
Read the case study
4. Broadcom: A Customer Self-Service Knowledge Portal
For customer experience and support teams, the same principle applies externally: make useful knowledge easy to find so customer issues can be resolved before anyone has to open a ticket or turn to other support channels. That's harder than it sounds. According to Gartner, the most common reason self-service fails is that customers can't find content relevant to their issue, which happens in 43% of failed cases.
Broadcom needed a customer self-service portal capable of serving a complex customer base across multiple industries and product lines. Rather than having customers navigate separate support experiences, the company created a single central place for account and product resources.
Once authenticated, customers can use entitlement-based dashboards to access information relevant to them, including:
- Product education and documentation
- Licensing information
- Software downloads
- Knowledge base articles
- Technical documentation
- Communities and blogs
- Customer support
- Case creation and tracking
Search helps users find knowledge base content and technical documentation, while communities work much like a community forum, where customers can learn from one another. If self-service resources don’t resolve the issue, users can switch to virtual or live support without leaving the portal.
Broadcom reported a 66% decrease in the number of clicks needed to access resources, along with fewer support tickets and increased customer satisfaction.
What can we learn from Broadcom? If you’re trying to improve customer self-service, knowledge management works best when information is connected to account context, product access, community resources, and support options.
Read the case study
What Do These Knowledge Management System Examples Have in Common?
Genworth, Materion, Airbus, and Broadcom each use knowledge differently. Still, their approaches share several practices worth keeping in mind as you plan your own knowledge management strategy, and together they underscore the importance of a strategic approach rather than simply adding another tool.
That kind of approach also depends on leadership support. Successful knowledge management initiatives need leaders who set priorities, commit resources, and reinforce knowledge sharing as part of how work gets done.
Knowledge is available where users already work
A knowledge management system shouldn’t create yet another destination users have to remember to check.
Genworth brings knowledge into its employee intranet. Airbus combines its knowledge base with IT service management. Broadcom places technical knowledge within the same customer portal people use for software, licenses, and support.
The closer the knowledge is to the task at hand, the easier it is to use, and the more naturally it encourages users to come back.
Information is organized to be found
Creating a large content library doesn’t automatically make knowledge accessible. Without consistent formatting and a clear content structure, even well-written articles can be hard to find or scan.
Users now expect the speed of consumer search engines and, increasingly, the direct answers of artificial intelligence. Effective knowledge management meets those expectations by giving users ways to quickly narrow down what matters through capabilities such as:
- Search, including AI-powered search
- Categories and metadata
- Clear navigation
- Permissions
- Personalization
- Structured content
Materion’s experience is a good example. The company didn’t simply add more internal information. It redesigned the experience around making policies, reference materials, and other resources easier for employees to locate. The strongest knowledge base examples follow the same principle, using featured articles, direct links to frequent tasks, and formats such as video or diagrams for visual learners.
Self-service can reduce pressure on support teams
If someone can answer a routine question independently, that’s one less request support agents or colleagues have to handle manually.
Airbus demonstrated this internally, with its IT portal contributing to a 30% reduction in incidents managed by the Service Desk. Broadcom applied a similar idea externally, reporting fewer customer support tickets after creating a more complete self-service experience.
Self-service doesn’t eliminate the need for support. Instead, it lets support teams focus on the questions that actually require human assistance.
Different audiences need different knowledge experiences
There’s no universal knowledge management interface that works equally well for everyone.
An employee looking for a policy has different needs than an Airbus user troubleshooting an IT issue. Likewise, a Broadcom customer searching for technical documentation on product features needs a different experience from that of a Genworth customer service representative. Needs vary within a single audience, too: developers may want documentation organized by programming languages, while new employees may benefit from personalized learning paths.
That’s why knowledge management can appear through employee intranets, customer self-service portals, partner knowledge hubs, and internal support tools rather than as a single fixed application. The right system adapts to user preferences, not the other way around.
Turn Enterprise Knowledge Into Useful Digital Experiences With Liferay DXP
Liferay DXP gives organizations the flexibility to build those experiences on a shared platform rather than maintaining a separate content management system for each one.
Key capabilities include:
- Search. Help users find relevant information across large volumes of content from a single search bar, with AI search capabilities that mean they don’t need to know exactly where something lives.
- Content management and governance. Create content, then organize, review, approve, and update it through structured content, workflows, and publishing controls.
- Roles and permissions. Control which employees, customers, partners, or other users can access specific information and experiences.
- Self-service experiences. Build intranets, customer portals, support hubs, and other digital experiences that enable users to find answers and complete common tasks independently.
- Personalization. Surface more relevant content based on factors such as audience, role, account, or behavior.
- Integrations. Connect knowledge experiences with existing business systems, repositories, support tools, and other applications.
- Feedback and analytics. Use data analytics to better understand user interactions with content and where information gaps may exist.
Because these capabilities sit within the same platform, organizations can support different knowledge audiences without treating each experience as a separate technology project, and a knowledge manager can govern content for every audience in one place.
Whether you’re building an employee intranet, an internal support hub, or a customer self-service portal, Liferay DXP can help make enterprise knowledge easier to find, manage, and use, laying the foundation for a learning organization where continuous learning is part of everyday work.
Explore Liferay DXP’s knowledge management capabilities to learn more.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is a real-world example of a knowledge management system?
Airbus offers one clear example of a knowledge management system in practice. Its IT self-service portal provides users with access to a searchable knowledge base, incident management, request tracking, equipment information, and service alerts.
The system helps users find answers and manage common IT needs without always having to rely on the Service Desk.
What are the most common types of knowledge management systems?
Knowledge management systems can take many forms, including employee intranets, internal knowledge bases, customer self-service portals and help centers, partner knowledge hubs, document repositories, and collaborative knowledge platforms.
The right approach depends largely on who needs access to the knowledge, what they need to accomplish with it, and how those needs may change in the future.
What is the difference between a knowledge management system and a knowledge base?
A knowledge base is generally a searchable collection of articles or other documentation.
A knowledge management system is broader, supporting the processes for capturing, organizing, governing, maintaining, and distributing knowledge across different experiences.
Can an intranet be a knowledge management system?
Yes. An intranet can serve as a knowledge management system by helping employees access, organize, share, and maintain organizational knowledge.
Genworth and Materion both demonstrate this approach. Their intranets give employees centralized access to company information while also supporting communication and collaboration.
Can customers use a knowledge management system?
Yes. Customer-facing knowledge management systems often appear as self-service portals or help centers.
Broadcom, for example, provides customers with access to knowledge base articles, technical documentation, product resources, communities, and support tools through a single portal.
