TL;DR
Treat documentation as owned operating infrastructure that coordinates work and preserves knowledge.
What the paper develops
Documentation is often funded as cleanup even though teams rely on it to coordinate decisions, transfer knowledge, onboard people, and recover from change. This paper reframes documentation as shared operating infrastructure with an owner, service level, and lifecycle. It explains how useful records reduce dependency on memory, accelerate cross-functional work, and make evidence available at the moment a decision is needed.
The operating move
Fund documentation as shared operating infrastructure, with an owner and maintenance cadence. Its value is faster coordination, safer handoffs, and less dependence on memory or individual availability.
OWNEREVIDENCENEXT COMMITMENT
Inside the white paper
- The coordination, continuity, and decision value of maintained documentation
- Ownership, audience, lifecycle, and maintenance responsibilities
- Practical signals for documentation health, use, and operating leverage
Sources and notes
- Leopold Müller, Joshua Holstein, Sarah Bause, Gerhard Satzger, and Niklas Kühl, "Data Quality Challenges in Retrieval-Augmented Generation," arXiv:2510.00552, submitted October 1, 2025; accepted for ICIS 2025. arxiv.org
- National Institute of Standards and Technology, "Artificial Intelligence Risk Management Framework: Generative Artificial Intelligence Profile," NIST AI 600-1, July 2024. doi.org
- International Organization for Standardization, "ISO 30401:2018 — Knowledge management systems — Requirements," November 2018. iso.org
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration, "Knowledge Management," APPEL Knowledge Services, updated June 12, 2026. nasa.gov
- Maria Olívia Ferreira Pereira, Helena de Fátima Nunes Silva, and José Simão de Paula Pinto, "A Memória organizacional nos processos de gestão do conhecimento: um estudo na Universidade Federal do Paraná," Informação & Informação 21, no. 1 (2016): 348–374. uel.br