Changing of the guard: A Nebraska perspective on institutional knowledge and inland fisheries management

ABSTRACT Institutional knowledge is the collective experience of an organization. In inland fisheries management, institutional knowledge includes technical reports, management plans, tool-based skills (i.e., how to run computer programs, boats, or nets), and experience-based decision making (i.e., sampling plan adjustments, navigating the organizational system). As an organization evolves, knowledge is created, shaped, and curated but can also be lost. Often within these organizations, select individuals serve as “silos” of information and experience. The current demographic and generational shift in the fisheries workforce occurring throughout the USA magnifies the importance of managing both incoming and outgoing institutional knowledge. For fisheries staff, the transfer of institutional knowledge depends on formal and informal relationships between staff, documentation of historic management actions, and training initiatives. In this exploratory perspective study conducted in 2023, we asked former, late-career, and newly hired Nebraska Game and Parks fisheries staff three questions to investigate what institutional knowledge the agency currently has, what wisdom has been lost, and, finally, how the agency should retain this knowledge. We found differences in perspectives between early- and late-career professionals (i.e., a focus on the how vs. the why), but also a solid bedrock of common sentiment (i.e., the passion to conserve, manage, and protect the resource). We hope this paper will provide useful insight for natural resource management agencies to ensure that useful institutional knowledge persists.