Tatyana Albertovna Gavrilova, Doctor of Technical Sciences, Professor, Head of the Department of Information Technology in Management at the Graduate School of Management of St. Petersburg University (GSOM), spoke about how knowledge engineering helps solve the problem of information distortion with the interaction of specialists from different fields, at the online conference Knowledge Сonf 2020.

The main problem of distortion in the perception and transmission of information in the interaction of narrow-profile experts and managers is an ambiguous interpretation: when discussing the same concept (idea, process or phenomenon), different individuals each imagine it differently.

The reasons for miscommunication may be psychological, linguistic or organizational. For example, organizational problems may be related to the specifics of managing a company, or of transferring knowledge between projects, or communication between departments, which may be in different time zones, and whose employees perhaps speak different languages. In addition, specialists with different qualifications perceive words in various contexts, which are associated with significant differences in education, experience and horizons. Psychological problems can be associated with the age and gender differences of employees, the speed of perception, depth, rigidity, reflexivity and other cognitive characteristics. Linguistic problems are precisely the problematic issues of communication inside and outside the professional environment, when it turns out that no one understands the experts, except for their colleagues.

Knowledge engineering, which offers effective models and methods for obtaining, structuring, and formalizing information, can help solve these problems. “In companies, regular training and meetings can be held between employees of different departments, which 

will crystallize a certain “common code” that is understandable to everyone. At the same time, it is useful to create a business dictionary (or corporate thesaurus) in the form of visual material, diagrams and knowledge cards. It is also useful to emphasize the development of emotional intelligence and empathy of employees, which greatly facilitates mutual understanding,” said Tatyana Gavrilova.

Knowledge Conf 2020 is a professional online conference on knowledge management, at which experts present reports on the topics of employee involvement and creating a culture of knowledge sharing; software development and the automation of knowledge management processes; knowledge management tools and their applicability to real work tasks, etc.