Centralized Taxonomy Management for Enterprise Information Systems
Enterprise Knowledge - Taxonomy Design Best Practices and Methodology
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Transcript of Enterprise Knowledge - Taxonomy Design Best Practices and Methodology
© Enterprise Knowledge, LLC
Cracking the Code on Taxonomy Design and Implementation
Taxonomy Design Business Value, Best Practices, and Lessons Learned
Zach WahlFounder and Principal
© Enterprise Knowledge, LLC
Agenda
• Defining the Business Taxonomy
– Importance of the Business Taxonomy
– The Business Taxonomy in Practice
• Taxonomy Design Methodology
• Taxonomy Design Best Practices
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DEFINING THE BUSINESS TAXONOMY
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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.
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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.
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Findability
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Taxonomy and Metadata
Metadata “Card”
Title
Author
Doc Type
Topic
Department
Brochures & ManualsMemosNewsPolicies & ProceduresPresentationsReports…
…Employee Services
CompensationRetirementInsuranceEducation & Training
ManufacturingSafetyQuality
…
Free Text Entry
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Taxonomy and Metadata
Content~Information~Data~Files
Metadata FieldsMetadata
ValuesTaxonomies (Flat or Hierarchical)~
Controlled Vocabularies
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Traditional v. Business Taxonomies
• Traditional taxonomies are classification for the sake of classification.
• Business taxonomies are classification for the sake of findability.
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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
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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.
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IMPORTANCE OF THE BUSINESS TAXONOMY
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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
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THE BUSINESS TAXONOMY IN PRACTICE
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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…
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YourOrganization
Here
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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…
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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
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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 …
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TAXONOMY DESIGN METHODOLOGY
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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.
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Top Down v. Bottom Up Approaches
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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
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Enterprise Knowledge’s Taxonomy Design Methodology
Business Case
Scoping
Knowledge Gathering
Taxonomy Team
Taxonomy Workshops
Taxonomy Focus Groups
User Testing
Content Tagging/Population
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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?
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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.
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Scoping
• Timeline– Set dates for “broader”
project (technology or organizational).
– Regulatory requirements.
• People– Availability
– Acceptance
– Understanding
• Technology– Requirements v. Capabilities
• Budget
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Taxonomy Scope Constraints
Timeline
Tech
no
logy Peo
ple
Budget
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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
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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
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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.
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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.
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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.
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Taxonomy Focus Groups
• “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.
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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.
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Content Tagging/Population
• 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
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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
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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.
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TAXONOMY DESIGN BEST PRACTICES
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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.
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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
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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:
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Tenured Employee New Employee
Technophile Technophobe
Younger Older
Native Speaker Foreign Language
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Understand your publishers
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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
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Understand Your Platform
• Taxonomy design seldom works outside the context of a business mission, typically tied to a technology:
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Web Content ManagementPortal Document Management
Records Management
Looser TighterLess Complex More Complex
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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.
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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
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Thank you.
Zach Wahl
Enterprise Knowledge, LLC
www.enterprise-knowledge.com
571.403.1109
@ZacharyWahl, @EKConsulting