Explicit knowledge
Explicit knowledge is knowledge that has been articulated and codified: procedures, specifications, drawings, manuals, checklists. Because it exists outside any one person's head, it can be transferred by handing over the artifact.
What is explicit knowledge?
Explicit knowledge is the visible tip of a company's knowledge. It is essential — nobody wants safety procedures living only in memory — but it is also the part least at risk when someone leaves, precisely because it is already written down.
Not to be confused with complete knowledge. A procedure documents the happy path someone thought to describe. The judgment about when the procedure does not apply is tacit and stays with the author. Companies that equate "documented" with "safe" discover the gap at the worst moment.
Why it matters for SME continuity
SMEs often respond to a coming retirement with a documentation sprint: write everything down. The result is a large body of explicit knowledge that answers the questions nobody was going to ask, while the expensive questions — why, when not, what if — remain unwritten because they were never explicit to begin with.
Explicit knowledge inside MentX
MentX treats explicit knowledge as context, not the goal. The knowledge base links what is documented to what is not: the meeting where the procedure was challenged, the intake session explaining its origin. The explicit and the tacit end up in one graph, cross-referenced and sourced.