Why we shouldn't lament the loss of knowledge in SMEs, but instead use AI in our day-to-day work.
Demographic change is no longer a future scenario, it is part of everyday life: in many medium-sized companies, the people who will be retiring in the next few years are the very people who „run the show“. Foremen, project managers, team leaders - people who solve problems before they even end up in the ticket.
At the same time, employees who know how to use digital tools but do not yet have the in-depth experience are moving up. The result is a gap that cannot be closed with new job advertisements: Experience goes out, complexity remains - and digital expertise is the new bottleneck.
The question is no longer, whether we have to take care of it, but how.
The real problem is not personnel - it is invisible knowledge
In conversations with managing directors and division heads, I hear the same phrases over and over again:
- „I don't even want to imagine the next revision without Mr. X.“
- „If Ms. Y is absent for a longer period of time, things come to a standstill here.“
- „We document it, but nobody can find it in everyday life.“
It's rarely about the sheer number of heads. It's about what's inside the heads:
- unwritten standards
- Shortcuts that save processes
- Experience values for when something is „still okay“ or „critical“
- Decisions that are made in the meeting - and that no one can properly track later on
This knowledge is often neither in a process manual nor in the wiki, but distributed via emails, team chats, individual notes and above all: in the gut feeling of experienced people.
When these people leave, their „if-then shortcuts“ go with them. That's where it hurts.
Two generations, two languages - and a common challenge
On the one hand:
- Employees with decades of practical experience
- who know every machine, every customer and every typical escalation
- but don't necessarily want yet another new piece of software
On the other hand:
- Younger colleagues who have grown up with digital tools
- who wonder why many processes still work on demand
- who want to learn - but can't fit in two hours of training every week
Both sides are right. And that's where the knot is created:
How do we bring together experience, digital expertise and day-to-day operations in such a way that it doesn't become another „project“ that is left behind after three months?
Why we amaiko have built: Securing knowledge in everyday life, not in a special project
We did not design amaiko as a new knowledge management tool, but as a AI Buddy in the normal Microsoft 365 working day.
The idea is simple:
- Instead of setting up a separate system for „knowledge assurance“,
- amaiko works where the work happens anyway: Outlook, Teams, OneNote, SharePoint, Planner.
This fundamentally changes two things:
- Knowledge is created and secured at the same moment.
Example: In a service meeting, a decision is made on how to deal with a specific error pattern with immediate effect. amaiko:- record the decision,
- store them in the appropriate document structure,
- and ensure that it can be quickly found again later in similar cases.
- Younger employees gain experience without having to „nag someone“.
Instead of asking in the hallway, they can speak to amaiko in plain language:- „Please show me the last three cases with customer Müller and how we solved them.“
- „How do we currently deal with quality level B complaints?“
Result: Experience is not documented in theory, but made usable in practice.
Concrete use cases from everyday life - no AI magic
What does that mean in practice? Three typical scenarios that we see with amaiko:
1. decisions from meetings are not left hanging in the room
With increasing pressure, meetings become shorter, topics denser and decisions faster. amaiko helps to ensure that these decisions don't disappear in emails and minutes later on, but are actually taken:
- can be found cleanly as „This is how we do it from now on“,
- be linked to context (Why? What is the decision based on?),
- and resurface in similar cases.
2. older employees pass on knowledge without giving lectures
Instead of setting up additional knowledge workshops, experienced colleagues can comment on their everyday cases:
- „With this error pattern, always check X first because...“
- „Never agree to feature Y spontaneously with this customer, first consult with sales.“
These tips do not end up in a drawer, but:
- in tickets,
- in customer files,
- in process descriptions - exactly where they are needed later.
3. new people get to work faster
Onboarding today often means: access to systems, a list of documents - and then „ask when something is wrong“. With amaiko, new employees can work their way through real cases step by step:
- „Show me similar projects from the last two years.“
- „What stumbling blocks did we have with systems of this type?“
The result is onboarding that is closer to reality and not just slides.
What amaiko deliberately does not do
Despite all the potential, clarity is important to me: amaiko does not replace people.
- He does not take responsibility away from anyone.
- He does not make decisions over heads.
- He does not promise to replicate decades of experience in two weeks.
What amaiko does:
It ensures that what teams already achieve in everyday life does not get lost in the noise, but is structured, findable and reusable. Within the existing Microsoft 365 authorizations, without new data storage, EU-compliant.
Conclusion: Loss of knowledge is not a law of nature
SMEs will not be able to stop demographic change. But they can decide whether valuable knowledge simply goes with them into retirement - or whether it remains part of the common working basis.
It is clear to us:
- Knowledge assurance does not belong in a project that „also has to run“,
- but in the middle of everyday life - where e-mails, meetings, decisions and documents are created anyway.
This is exactly where amaiko comes in. As an AI buddy in everyday Microsoft 365 work, it helps to link experience, decisions and standards in such a way that they are still effective even when the people behind them have long since retired.
