Knowledge Summit Dublin 2025: Insights on AI, Knowledge Management & Human Experience

This guest post is written by Mairéad Mc Keown, Knowledge and Market Intelligence Manager in Bord Bia.

Claire Ann Ferry, Robin Andrews and Mairéad Mc Keown (Bord Bia) pictured at Knowledge Summit Dublin 2025.
Picture credit: Mairéad McKeown, 2025

Executive Summary & Introduction

This June, Trinity College Dublin played host to the Knowledge Summit Dublin 2025—a landmark event for librarians, knowledge managers, and information professionals across Ireland. Unlike traditional conferences, this summit championed co-creation, open conversation, and the evolving partnership between artificial intelligence (AI) and human expertise. For those of us working at the frontline of knowledge and library services, the event offered a timely reminder: while technology is advancing rapidly, it’s our human-centred approaches that truly shape the future of knowledge management (KM).

Drawing on the official event summary and our own experiences at Bord Bia, this review distils the most relevant insights for KM and library professionals, with practical examples to help you bring these learnings to life.

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8 Key Learnings and Insights for Our Professions

1. Knowledge Management: Never Static, Always Evolving

The summit’s core message was clear: KM is not a static or fixed concept. There is no one size fits all definition, rather it is shaped by context, culture, and the needs of each organisation. Whether you’re developing strategies for your library, designing information systems, or facilitating organisational learning, KM is about connecting people with the right knowledge—when and where it’s needed. As Zach Wahl put it, knowledge managers are the “connectors” who help organisations make better decisions and foster deeper understanding (Knowledge Summit Dublin Organising Committee, 2025, p.10).

Bord Bia Example:

At Bord Bia, our KM approach flexes to support everything from onboarding new staff to delivering commercially impactful insights. We see ourselves as “connectors,” enabling better decision-making and deeper understanding across the organisation.

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2. Keeping Humans in the Loop

While AI is transforming our field, the summit reinforced that human insight remains irreplaceable. AI can process vast datasets and highlight patterns, but it lacks the ethical judgement and contextual sensitivity that librarians and knowledge managers provide. The consensus was clear: AI should be a mentor, not a shortcut. Embedding human checkpoints in AI workflows ensures that knowledge outputs are validated and meaningful. As Ninez Piezas-Jerbi said, “Start with the human moments. That’s how you shift culture” (McKeown and Ferry, 2025; Knowledge Summit Dublin Organising Committee, 2025, p.12).

Bord Bia Example:

Our library team always reviews outputs from vendor LLMs before deploying them to support desk research. This ensures that AI serves as a mentor—enhancing, not replacing, human expertise.

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3. KM at the Strategic Centre

Knowledge management should not be siloed in a single department, delivering the greatest impact when it’s embedded at the heart of organisational strategy. For libraries and information services, this means advocating for executive sponsorship so that KM can sit at the strategic centre of the organisation, enabling collaboration, learning, and decision-making across all levels. KM thrives when it is a “networked presence” embedded wherever value is created (Knowledge Summit Dublin Organising Committee, 2025, p.14).

Bord Bia Example:

KM is woven into strategic activities from talent management and stakeholder events to insight engagement and service delivery. By positioning KM as a “networked presence,” we activate our community’s collective intelligence.

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4. Making KM a Daily Practice

The summit highlighted the importance of making KM a daily habit, not just a strategy. This means establishing communities of practice, designing information architectures that make knowledge findable, and implementing governance frameworks to ensure quality and trust. Storytelling, shared experiences, and rituals—like the pre-summit hike—help embed KM into organisational culture and foster a sense of belonging (McKeown and Ferry, 2025; Knowledge Summit Dublin Organising Committee, 2025, p.16).

Bord Bia Example:

We use rituals like storytelling, knowledge cafés, and reflective debriefs to make KM a valued, everyday practice. These activities strengthen engagement and a sense of belonging.

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5. Content Management and AI Foundations

The adage “garbage in, garbage out” rings especially true. AI is only as good as the content it draws from, so robust content governance, clear ownership, and continuous curation are essential. Knowledge graphs and auto-tagging help provide context and improve accuracy, but human oversight remains vital (McKeown and Ferry, 2025; Knowledge Summit Dublin Organising Committee, 2025, p.18).

Bord Bia Example:

Our Knowledge & Market Intelligence team reviews all AI-assisted executive summaries and auto-generated tags before publishing content on our Knowledge Management system. This human oversight ensures our knowledge outputs remain accurate and relevant.

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6. AI and KM: A Strategic Partnership

AI is a tool—not the strategy itself. When applied thoughtfully, it can accelerate knowledge discovery and enhance decision-making, but only if strong KM foundations are in place. The future of KM is not AI-driven, but AI-augmented, with humans firmly in the loop. As Toni Ressaire noted, “The whole purpose of AI is to enable human experience” (McKeown and Ferry, 2025; Knowledge Summit Dublin Organising Committee, 2025, p.20).

Bord Bia Example:

We empower our community to use Gen AI responsibly and in line with our Gen AI policy by delivering upskilling programmes underpinned by strong adult learning principles and practical KM tools. Our goal is to enable colleagues to use AI as a mentor, not a replacement.

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7. Surfacing Tacit Knowledge

Capturing tacit knowledge—the know-how that lives in people’s heads—remains one of KM’s greatest challenges. Trust-based relationships, storytelling, mentoring, and reflective practice are key to surfacing this knowledge. The summit’s flipped format encouraged active learning and co-creation, turning attendees into contributors rather than passive listeners (McKeown and Ferry, 2025; Knowledge Summit Dublin Organising Committee, 2025, p.22).

Bord Bia Example:

We host knowledge cafés, lessons learned debriefs to help our community share insights and experiences in a meaningful way.

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8. KM’s Future: Resilience, Relevance, and Reflection

The future of KM is about helping organisations thrive in complexity. Rather than building bigger repositories, leading practitioners are embracing agile, test-and-learn approaches—piloting small initiatives, learning from what works, and scaling success. KM plays a vital role in building organisational resilience, supporting onboarding, and enabling collaboration across silos. Creating space for reflection and sensemaking is just as important as speed (McKeown and Ferry, 2025; Knowledge Summit Dublin Organising Committee, 2025, p.24).

Bord Bia Example:

Our Copilot Colleague Upskilling Programme was piloted with a small group and, due to its success, is now being scaled across the organisation.

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Thought Starters: Moving from Insight to Action

To help you reflect on the practical “so what?” of these learnings, here are five thought starters for you and your team:

1. Context-Driven Connection

How well do you understand the unique knowledge needs of your community or organisation? Consider a recent decision or project—did you connect the right people with the right knowledge at the right time? What new opportunities could you create by mapping these connections more intentionally?

2. Responsible AI Adoption

What safeguards do you have in place to ensure AI tools are used ethically and effectively in your library or organisation? Are there clear checkpoints for human review, and do your colleagues feel confident in using AI as a mentor rather than a replacement?

3. Embedding KM in Strategy

Is knowledge management visible and valued at the strategic level in your institution or organisation? How might you advocate for executive sponsorship or integrate KM into key decision-making processes?

4. Surfacing Tacit Knowledge

What practical steps could you take to capture and share the unwritten expertise within your team? Are there rituals, forums, or reflective practices you could introduce to make tacit knowledge more visible and actionable?

5. Navigating Complexity with Small Bets

How might you encourage your community or organisation to experiment with small, low-risk KM initiatives to address complex challenges? What mechanisms do you have for learning from these experiments and scaling what works?

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Conclusion

The Knowledge Summit Dublin 2025 was a powerful reminder that KM is, at its core, a human-centred practice. Technology will continue to evolve, but it’s our curiosity, connections, and culture that drive true progress. By joining up the dots between people, process, technology, and culture—and by keeping humans firmly in the loop—we can embed KM into daily practice and help our libraries and organisations thrive in a changing world.

For further details, visit the https://www.knowledgesummitdublin.com/


Bibliography

• McKeown, M. and Ferry, C.A., 2025. Knowledge Summit Dublin 2025 Conference Review Presentation. [PowerPoint presentation] 23-24 June 2025.
• Knowledge Summit Dublin Organising Committee, 2025. Knowledge Summit Dublin 2025 – Event Summary V1. [pdf] Available at: https://www.knowledgesummitdublin.com/ [Accessed 9 December 2025].
• Knowledge Summit Dublin, 2025. Knowledge Summit Dublin Website. [online] Available at: https://www.knowledgesummitdublin.com/ [Accessed 9 December 2025].

Libfocus Link-out for December 2025

Welcome to the December edition of the Libfocus link-out, an assemblage of library-related things we have found informative, educational, thought-provoking and insightful on the Web over the past while.

Images from this month's link-out article

Shine bright like a diamond: what can library hosting services offer in the academic publishing market?

Cathy Dishman and Rebecca Wojturska compare two diamond open access (OA) publishing services at University of Edinburgh and Liverpool John Moores University.

Why is knowledge getting so expensive?
In this TED talk Jeff Edmunds, Digital Access Coordinator at the Penn State University Libraries, explains why libraries have lost ownership of their digital collections and what can be done to fix that problem.

Face Value: How Living with an Appearance Difference Informs Library Customer Service.
Maeve Kerins, (TUD) explores how living with a visible difference shapes professional practice in a public-facing academic library role.

We Made FETCH Happen: A New Improved Inventory Management System.
Library of Congress’, Chief of the Collections Management Division, Matt Martin, discusses the process of designing and implementing a new inventory management system for offsite storage.

Why have so many people stopped posting on social media?
In this RTE Brainstorm article, Aoife Ryan Christensen examines why time spent on social media platforms has steadily declined since 2022.

The Librarian’s Call: Documenting Is Resistance.
This Common Dreams article by Rodney Freeman Jr. is a call to action for staff in libraries and archives who collect, preserve, and share facts. At a time when historical records are being deliberately erased it's important for us to 'document clearly, share responsibly, preserve redundantly, and hold the line until silence cannot take root.'

For Researchers in the Humanities, Is Open Really Fair?
Lai Ma and Claire Davin critically situate the socio-structural condition of humanities scholars in the open science and research movement, validly arguing that perceptions, practices, and experiences not only differ across disciplines but also pose significant challenges for the individual humanities scholar.

Text and Data Mining Literacy for Librarians.
Whitney Kramer and Iliana Burgos discuss on The Authority File the rationale for their book 'Text and Data Mining Literacy for Librarians' (co-edited with Evan Muzzall). The book is a must-get for any academic and research library out there.

Teaching AI as an anti-AI Librarian.
Interesting thoughts from Eleanor Ball on UNI that looks at how to teach AI as a Librarian when you don't particularly embrace it. 

What do College students lose when libraries are ignored?
Jane Jiang takes a look at the increasing pressures facing academic libraries in the US and what the implications for students in this Scholarly Kitchen article.

How Maynooth University Library is thinking beyond the Dewey Decimal System to help students

This guest post is by Ashley Burke who is a Library Assistant based in Engagement and Information Services in Maynooth University Library.

A staff member shelving books in Maynooth University Library. Picture credit: Alan Lawrence, 2020.

For many students, library shelves are just another backdrop to study sessions and essay marathons. But beneath the quiet hum of activity at Maynooth University Library, something quietly radical is happening. Maynooth’s librarians are finding creative, student-focused ways to work around its most outdated aspects - ensuring that knowledge is not only categorised but made genuinely accessible, inclusive, and relevant to today’s academic and cultural landscape.

The Dewey Decimal System, established in 1876, was never designed with today’s diverse student body in mind. Its Western, Christian-centric structure often marginalises non-dominant worldviews—tucking entire cultures, religions, and fields of study into oversimplified or inappropriate categories.

At Maynooth University Library, the response has been to strategically subvert its limitations. Librarians are implementing tools and practices that help students navigate beyond Dewey’s blind spots, offering a more equitable and intuitive user experience.

Curated Displays and Thematic Collections

One of Maynooth’s most visible interventions is its commitment to curated collections both online and displays within the Library that bring underrepresented voices to the fore. The library regularly features thematic displays on topics such as LGBTQ+, the Black and African diaspora, and the Traveller Communities - highlighting works that might otherwise be buried in Dewey’s less-than-intuitive categories.

Oftentimes books that I think should be together are shelved by Dewey number in separate areas which makes them hard to find by general browsing. Geography is one example of this. Geography is mainly kept in the 900s but if you wanted physical Geography e.g. Geomorphology you would need to look in the 500s, while human Geography is in the 300s. By pulling these materials together in dedicated displays and collections, Maynooth ensures that students encounter diverse perspectives without always needing to decipher a complex classification code.

Evolving Dewey and reshelving

Dewey isn’t as static as it may seem from the outside. We are constantly shifting and evolving our use of it. One example I was part of recently was the Musical Score reclassification where the scores were reclassified and relabelled to ensure composers' works were shelved together. This made browsing works by one composer easier for the user. This has been met with positive feedback. 

Another project the Library is undertaking soon will be the relabelling and classification of certain Irish law books to the base number 346. At the moment some of the Irish law books are shelved with the UK law books - this will mean a lot of shifting in the law section but will give a better user experience when browsing.

Maynooth University Library is also at the forefront of efforts to reclaim Irish identity within library catalogues. Where Dewey might lump Irish Travellers, Irish history, and literature into broader Nomad, British or Celtic categories, Maynooth University’s librarians are actively tagging and reclassifying content to reflect Irish political, linguistic, and cultural autonomy.

This academic year’s addition of the Faculty of Nursing has seen our Natural Sciences collection grow to accommodate these new Nursing books. For me as a reshelver, it has meant making room to add these books and ensure they are accessible to new students.

While reshelving I can see disparities in legacy cataloguing practices, for example the Anglo-Irish books. As we improve classification processes, as new books come in, these disparities are being ironed out and materials are made more accessible. This in turn means books are being grouped together in a better way ensuring that they can be more easily browsed by Library users.

Teaching Students to better use the System

Crucially, Maynooth isn’t just working around Dewey - it’s empowering students to understand it and leverage its positive aspects. The library offers workshops and orientation sessions that explore how classification systems like Dewey can be best used in their own academic work and how best to navigate the Library. Teaching and Learning Librarians use various LIST sessions to promote the Library and what it can do for students at the beginning of each semester. The Library also offers Finish Strong initiatives in the lead up to exams and semester deadlines.

Staff at the Information desk ensure that they are there to help students access the knowledge they need both online and physically. The front desk staff hours have recently been adjusted to better align with the students’ needs and presence on campus. Social media tools are being heavily utilised to better engage with the student population and help equip students with the knowledge they need to succeed. Covering the desk allows me to keep an ear to the ground to see what students are struggling with and positions me to curate content for social media to assist them. It is always a pleasure bringing students on their Library discovery journey and seeing them go from not knowing how to look up a book, to successfully navigating and using the Library’s many services.

While reshelving the books upstairs I often get questions from students. It is rewarding helping someone learn how the Library is laid out and where to find what they are looking for. It also helps me identify missing or lost books and get them back to the shelves as quickly as we can.

Conclusion: More Than Just Shelves

Maynooth University Library’s approach offers a powerful model for other institutions grappling with legacy systems. By layering inclusive practices, digital innovation, and critical engagement on top of Dewey’s existing framework, the library is building something much more valuable than a traditional classification system: a dynamic, student-first knowledge environment. 

At Maynooth University, the library isn’t just a place to find books—it’s a place to rethink how knowledge is organised, accessed, and valued. By finding creative ways around Dewey’s limitations, the library is helping students not just locate information, but understand the systems behind it, and challenge those systems when they fall short.

In doing so, Maynooth is showing that the future of libraries isn’t about rigid categories—it’s about curiosity, inclusivity, and empowerment.