Enterprise Knowledge

© Enterprise Knowledge, LLC

Cracking the Code on Taxonomy Design and Implementation

Taxonomy Design Business Value, Best Practices, and Lessons Learned

Zach WahlFounder and Principal


Agenda

• Defining the Business Taxonomy

– Importance of the Business Taxonomy

– The Business Taxonomy in Practice

• Taxonomy Design Methodology

• Taxonomy Design Best Practices

1


DEFINING THE BUSINESS TAXONOMY


Taxonomy Definitions

tax·on·o·my (tāk-sōn-mē)n. pl. tax·on·o·mies

1. The classification of organisms in an ordered system that indicates natural relationships.

2. The science, laws, or principles of classification; systematics.

3. Division into ordered groups or categories: "Scholars have been laboring to develop a taxonomy of young killers" (Aric Press).

Zach’s Definition – Controlled vocabularies used to describe or characterize explicit concepts of information, for purposes of capture, management, and presentation.

3


Taxonomy and Metadata

• Provide structure to unstructured information.

• Join or relate multiple disparate sources of information.

• Provide multiple avenues to find and discover information.

• Enable findability.

4

Findability

© Enterprise Knowledge, LLC5


Metadata “Card”

Title

Author

Doc Type

Topic

Department

Brochures & ManualsMemosNewsPolicies & ProceduresPresentationsReports…

…Employee Services

CompensationRetirementInsuranceEducation & Training

ManufacturingSafetyQuality

…

Free Text Entry



Content~Information~Data~Files

Metadata FieldsMetadata

ValuesTaxonomies (Flat or Hierarchical)~

Controlled Vocabularies


Traditional v. Business Taxonomies

• Traditional taxonomies are classification for the sake of classification.

• Business taxonomies are classification for the sake of findability.

7


Traditional v. Business Taxonomies

Traditional Taxonomy Business Taxonomy

Purpose Categorization Findability

Designed By Scientists/Librarians The Business

Managed By Scientists/Librarians The Business

Used By Scientists/Librarians Everyone

Complexity Deep, Wide, Detailed Flat, Simple,Deconstructed

Key Characteristics Mutually Exclusive, Collectively Exhaustive

Usable, Intuitive, Natural


The Business Taxonomy

• Usable – Easy to adopt and utilize for any skill level.

– Relatively flat (2-3 levels)

– “Easy” to navigate

• Intuitive – Does not require training. Reflects the way the user thinks.

• Natural – Uses the organization, vocabulary, and logic of the user.

9


IMPORTANCE OF THE BUSINESS TAXONOMY


The Information Management Challenge

• “Democratization of Content Management” has resulted in exponential increases in information.

• Today, 80% of business in conducted on unstructured information – Gartner Group

• Unstructured data doubles every three months –Gartner Group

• Knowledge workers spend from 15% to 35% of their time searching for information and 40% of corporate users reported that they can not find the information they need to do their jobs on their intranets – Sue Feldman, IDC

11


THE BUSINESS TAXONOMY IN PRACTICE


Business Taxonomy Example - Bluefly

Metadata Field: Size

Taxonomy Values:4.55.566.578…

Metadata Field: Color

Taxonomy Values:BlackBlueBrownGreenGreyIvory…

Metadata Field: Type

Taxonomy Values:Athletic InspiredBootsLoafers and Slip-onsOxfords and MoreSandals

Metadata Field: Brand

Taxonomy Values:Antonio MauriziBacco BucciBen ShermanBruno Magli…


YourOrganization

Here

14

Business Taxonomy for Your Organization

Metadata Field: Topic

Taxonomy Values:ManufacturingBenefitsInfrastructureQuality…

Metadata Field: Document Type

Taxonomy Values:FormsPoliciesProceduresReportsNews…

Metadata Field: Locale

Taxonomy Values:North AmericaEuropeAsiaSouth America…

Metadata Field: Department

Taxonomy Values:HRSales and MarketingCommunications…


Multiple Taxonomies Combine Synergistically

– Categorize in multiple, independent, categories.

– Allow combinations of categories to narrow the choice of items.

– 4 independent categories of 10 nodes each have the same discriminatory power as one hierarchy of 10,000 nodes

• Easier to maintain

• Easier to reuse existing material

42 values to maintain (10+6+11+15)9900 combinations (10x6x11x15)

Main

Ingredients

Cooking

MethodsMeal Type Cuisines

• Chocolate

• Dairy

• Fruits

• Grains

• Meat &

Seafood

• Nuts

• Olives

• Pasta

• Spices &

Seasonings

• Vegetables

• Breakfast

• Brunch

• Lunch

• Supper

• Dinner

• Snack

• African

• American

• Asian

• Caribbean

• Continental

• Eclectic/

Fusion/

International

• Jewish

• Latin American

• Mediterranean

• Middle Eastern

• Vegetarian

• Advanced

• Bake

• Broil

• Fry

• Grill

• Marinade

• Microwave

• No Cooking

• Poach

• Quick

• Roast

• Sauté

• Slow

Cooking

• Steam

• Stir-fry


Common Metadata Fields

Method Definition Examples

Subject-oriented Information categorized by subject or topic.

• Instantive - each child category is an instance of the parent category

• Partitive - each child category is a part of the parent category

water pollution, soil pollution, air pollution…

Functional Information categorized by the process to which it relates

employment, staffing, training

Organizational Information categorized by corporate departments or business entities.

Human Resources, Marketing, Accounting, Research…

Document Type Information categorized by the type of document

presentations, expense reports, press releases …


TAXONOMY DESIGN METHODOLOGY


Top Down

• Work with business stakeholders and functionally-or subject-based individuals or focus groups

• Identify overall metadata fields and major categories of information

• Subdivide categories as necessary to build taxonomy

• Individual-driven; may entrench obsolete or arbitrary categories

Bottom Up• Identify overall corpus of

content and major content collections

• Analyze content collections using automated textual analysis tools

• Reveal major and minor topics of information; build taxonomy based on the relationship of these topics

• Automated process will often yield most logical design, not most intuitive.

18

Top Down v. Bottom Up Approaches


Enterprise Knowledge’s Taxonomy Design Methodology

Business Case

Scoping

Knowledge Gathering

Taxonomy Team

Taxonomy Workshops

Taxonomy Focus Groups

User Testing

Content Tagging/Population

Maintenance and Evolution

Planning Design Testing & Deployment


Enterprise Knowledge’s Taxonomy Design Methodology

Business Case

Scoping

Knowledge Gathering

Taxonomy Team

Taxonomy Workshops


User Testing



Business Case

• Define audience.

• Define the mission of your audience.

• Define the true reasons for designing the taxonomy.

• What specifically can the taxonomy do for the end business users?

21

Any organization can say “we want to build a taxonomy to make finding information easier for our users,” but what does that tell us? How does that help us? We need to understand our users from the business perspective and answer the question: We want our on-the-road sales staff to have one-click access to customer news. We want every employee to find any form we have without calling or emailing anyone. We want new employees to be able to find everything they need to get started on Day 1.


Scoping

• Timeline– Set dates for “broader”

project (technology or organizational).

– Regulatory requirements.

• People– Availability

– Acceptance

– Understanding

• Technology– Requirements v. Capabilities

• Budget

22

Taxonomy Scope Constraints

Timeline

Tech

no

logy Peo

ple

Budget


Knowledge Gathering

• Communication, Education, and Marketing:– Set user expectations

– Translate “pain points” to solutions in real time

– Create “buzz” around the project

– Market the results, not the definitions

• Identify taxonomy and content starting points– Key stakeholders and early adopters

– Existing taxonomies and information systems

– Critical “must find” content

23

Physical

LocationFile Type(s) Metadata Users

(w eb site, database,

f ile server)

(.doc, .xls, .pdf,

.html, etc.)(Y/N)

Applicable

(Y/N)If yes, who MAY access Justification

Access Restrictions

Document Collection Name


Taxonomy Team

• Convene wide-spectrum team (12-18 people) to represent their components of the organization. Strive for diversity in:– Function

– Hierarchy (to a degree)

– Tenure

– Geography

• Strive to identify individuals who “get it,” but also yield influence in their respective domains.

• Participation should become an official and measurable job activity, supported by management.

24


Taxonomy Team

• The Taxonomy Team will ensure the taxonomy is a true business taxonomy.– Participate in initial workshops to identify metadata fields

and top-down taxonomy design.

– Identify and enlist additional representatives for follow-on workshops, focus groups, and testing.

– Support the content migration (and tagging) process.

• The Taxonomy Team will continue to meet throughout the length of the effort, and ideally beyond.

25


Taxonomy Workshops

• Enterprise Knowledge’s Taxonomy Workshop methodology is a repeatable process that translates natural business thinking into taxonomy and metadata design:– Business Case

– Audience Definition

– Verb Identification

– Noun Identification

– Metadata Field Prioritization

• The workshop can be used throughout the project with different groups and at different areas of focus and levels of detail.

26



• “Spin-off” groups can be leveraged to accomplish more specific design requirements:

– Design of secondary and tertiary metadata fields that are less “controversial.”

– Identification of tertiary metadata fields and taxonomies of values for specific sections of the core taxonomy.

– Spot testing/validating content against taxonomy.

27


User Testing

• Testing takes place throughout the project with multiple test groups:

– Taxonomy Team and Focus Group participants

– Other content owners and stakeholders

– End users

• Testing should be multi-directional.

– Test consistent tagging of taxonomy onto content (card-sorting)

– Test consistent navigation of taxonomy to find content (find-it)

• We are not seeking perfection, we are seeking majority.

28



• Time and labor intensive at multiple levels

• Opportunity to validate taxonomy design – begin with most critical content

• Opportunity not just for migration, but cleanup

• Population Strategies– Manual upload of documents

– Auto-categorization tools

– “Paper” migration followed by third-party tagging

• Consider long term sustainability issues when constructing filters and other population mechanisms

29


Maintenance and Evolution

• Establish clear taxonomy governance:– Policies and Procedures

– Roles and Responsibilities

– Communications, Education, and Marketing

• Maintain the Taxonomy Team to guide future development

• Continuously reexamine the taxonomy

• Establish mechanisms to gather user feedback and respond to it in a timely manner

30

Most of the work in an average taxonomy project will take place within the Maintenance and Evolution Stage.

No initial rollout of a taxonomy will yield 100% perfection. Striving for that will only delay your project and risk your sanity. By preparing for this on going work, you ensure the hard work of the project team will not be lost. With the correct mechanisms in place, the team can respond to user feedback and bring the taxonomy closer to 100% perfection over time.


TAXONOMY DESIGN BEST PRACTICES


Define Taxonomy Project Objectives Early

• Define a simple business case to help control scope and communicate with end users and stakeholders.

• Develop a timeline and listing of phases to detail when specific milestones will be met.

• Limit initial scope to ensure success.

32


Employ Quality Measurements and Analytics

• Use both active and passive analytics:

– Surveys• Satisfaction

• Time Saved

• Anecdotal Evidence

– Search terms

– Size of hit lists

– Dead ends

• Consistency Testing

• Time Tests

33


Understand your audience

• End users drive the language and complexity of the structure.

– Who are they?

– Who is the lowest common denominator?

– Define the “spectrum of experience:

34

Tenured Employee New Employee

Technophile Technophobe

Younger Older

Native Speaker Foreign Language


Understand your publishers

35

Information Professional Business User

Dedicated Position Part-time (Volunteer)

Few Publishers Many Publishers

Homogenous Publishers Diverse Publishers

• Publisher determine the reasonable complexity of a taxonomy/metadata strategy:

– Acceptable amount of time per document

– Number of metadata fields

– Complexity of taxonomy


Understand Your Platform

• Taxonomy design seldom works outside the context of a business mission, typically tied to a technology:

36

Web Content ManagementPortal Document Management

Records Management

Looser TighterLess Complex More Complex


Always Focus on Your User

• Recognize that users may think about and look for information in different ways

• Understand your business practices and use the most appropriate categorization method(s)

• Consider multiple taxonomies for disparate audiences

• Use familiar vocabulary and organizational schemas to ensure a logical browsing experience.

37


Make a Long-term Investment

• Taxonomy development is an iterative and on-going effort– Respond to change: validate and modify regularly

– Invest in dedicated, long-term resources

• Initial effort must have foresight– Establish a solid foundation

– Allow extensibility to accommodate new information

– Plan for iterative development

• Consider auto-categorization/auto-taxonomizationtechnologies– But recognize that human intervention and oversight is critical

• Establish maintenance and governance processes– Conduct regular (quarterly) taxonomy and content categorization

reviews

38


Thank you.

Zach Wahl

Enterprise Knowledge, LLC

www.enterprise-knowledge.com

571.403.1109

[email protected]

@ZacharyWahl, @EKConsulting

Enterprise Knowledge - Taxonomy Design Best Practices and Methodology

Technology

business taxonomy importance

topic taxonomy values

department taxonomy

locale taxonomy values

brand taxonomy values

color taxonomy values

size taxonomy values