24 Examples of Knowledge Quality

John Spacey, June 10, 2023

Knowledge quality is the value of knowledge. This includes its usefulness, relevance, timeliness, accuracy, precision and traceability. Knowledge can be useful without being completely accurate. Likewise, knowledge that is accurate can be useless. As such, assessing the quality of knowledge requires context and insight into how the knowledge is used and whether it is fit for purpose. The following are common elements of knowledge quality.

Usefulness	Credibility
Based on evidence or expertise	Traceability – a record of how the knowledge originated
Accuracy	Free from errors
Free of biases	Verified
Peer reviewed	Relevance
Fit for purpose – useful given its context of use	Completeness
Timeliness and freshness	Objectivity
Consistency	Ethical – respects privacy, intellectual property rights and sensitivities
Validity	Transparent – knowledge that is open to challenge and inspection
Maintained and improved – knowledge that is actively improved	Discoverable – knowledge that can be searched and explored
Accessibility – the knowledge is available where it is needed	Actionable – knowledge that can be used to improve actions and decisions
Non-obvious – obvious statements aren’t particularly valuable	Knowledge advantage – knowledge that isn’t available to the competition

Knowledge quality shouldn't be confused with correctness. Quality is more about usefulness and value given the purpose of knowledge. Knowledge that is somewhat ambiguous and partially incorrect could still be quite high quality. For example, a well-connected salesperson who often identifies firms that "appear to be" in the market for an expensive software product. This knowledge may be completely ambiguous and based on rumor but nonetheless may be worth far more than certain knowledge that is available to all competitors.

Next read: Examples of Knowledge Analysis

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