Taxonomy Governance and Maintenance November 12, 2010, 11:30-12:30 ET

1. Taxonomy Governance and MaintenanceNovember 12, 2010, 11:30-12:30 ET Nicholas Nylund, Principal Analyst Joseph A. Busch, Senior Principal

2. Agenda • Taxonomy Definition • Governance Definition • Benefits of Governance • Drivers • Governance Structure (4 Pillars) • Keys to Governance • A View of What’s Next

3. Taxonomy and Metadata • Primary tools to provide structure to unstructured information • Depending on system design and use, may be front-end or back-end functionality • Taxonomy (categorization) is often actualized by applying metadata to documents • Enable findability 3

4. Definitions

5. Definitions Metadata Title Author Department Audience Topic

6. Taxonomy Definition • Governance Definition • Benefits of Governance • Drivers • Governance Structure (4 Pillars) • Keys to Governance • A View of What’s Next

7. Knowledge Governance • Knowledge Governance • The foundation of policies and procedures that govern a project, system, or information and ensure its lifecycle evolution • How information is created, shared, and retained • Connects knowledge processes with organizational processes

8. Taxonomy Governance • Taxonomy evolution • Top-level topic creation/deletion • Second-level topic creation/deletion • Adding metadata • Governance committee representing • Steering Committee • Content Owners • Content Contributors • The creation of a new top-level taxonomy node requires the convening of a taxonomy workshop • Review the principles and best practices of taxonomy development • Ensure that the topical weight of the taxonomy is not compromised • Considering the volume of content that will be tagged using a taxonomy and metadata schema, changes to metadata fields should be formally presented as a business case and reviewed by the Steering Committee

9. Taxonomy Definition • Governance Definition • Benefits of Governance • Drivers • Governance Structure (4 Pillars) • Keys to Governance • A View of What’s Next

10. Benefits of Governance

11. Taxonomy Definition • Governance Definition • Benefits of Governance • Drivers • Governance Structure (4 Pillars) • Keys to Governance • A View of What’s Next

12. Taxonomy Governance Drivers • Factors that contribute to taxonomy governance include: • How easy it is for users to find information • How users look for information • How users store and retrieve information • How redundant information is • What metadata is available • What templates are used

13. Governance for Everyone • Audience: • The governance plan should be available to all members of the governance team, as well as all users of the system • The challenge of a governance plan is to write it plainly so a broad user audience may understand how to accomplish tasks within it

14. Taxonomy Definition • Governance Definition • Benefits of Governance • Drivers • Governance Structure (4 Pillars) • Establishing a vision • Roles and responsibilities • Policies and procedures • Communications, education, and marketing • Keys to Governance • A View of What’s Next

15. Four Pillars of Governance • In the Governance Plan, it is important to define: • Establishing a vision • Roles and responsibilities • Policies and procedures • Communications, education, and marketing

16. Taxonomy Definition • Governance Definition • Benefits of Governance • Drivers • Governance Structure (4 Pillars) • Establishing a vision • Roles and responsibilities • Policies and procedures • Communications, education, and marketing • Keys to Governance • A View of What’s Next

17. Governance StructureEstablishing a Vision • Benefits of a Vision: • Serves as guide as you create a roadmap for the Governance Plan • Aids with future site evolution

18. Governance StructureEstablishing a Vision • Create a value statement: • Affirms the vision • Provides users with the ability to understand why the taxonomy exists • Helps users understand what they can expect from the system • Controls project scope • Sets end user expectations Sample Value Statement “System will provide the ability to better leverage existing technology and information resources by providing a single user interface, ensuring users have access to knowledge when, where, and in the form that they need it.”

19. Taxonomy Definition • Governance Definition • Benefits of Governance • Drivers • Governance Structure (4 Pillars) • Establishing a vision • Roles and responsibilities • Policies and procedures • Communications, education, and marketing • Keys to Governance • A View of What’s Next

20. Governance StructureRoles and Responsibilities • Most Common Roles

21. Governance StructureSample Roles Matrix 21

22. Governance StructureBuild a Steering Committee • Six to nine stakeholders from both technical and business areas • Meet regularly (e.g., quarterly) to discuss maintenance and evolution • Steering committee should work as a group to build initial Governance Plan

23. Governance StructureRoles and Responsibilities • Steering Committee: • Serves as the governing body of the environment • Responsible for the strategic plan • Establishes the standards and policies governing the environment • Drives initiatives for further development • Enforces the majority of governance policies and procedures

24. Governance StructureRoles and Responsibilities • Taxonomy Team: • Ensures overall evolution of the taxonomy and metadata • Controls taxonomy depth and breadth • Review requests for creating, editing, or deleting components in the taxonomy and metadata • Enforce policies and procedures for executing such actions

25. Governance StructureRoles and Responsibilities • Content Management Team : • Content creators, authors, and owners • Trained in the concepts of taxonomy and metadata schema • Provides feedback to the Taxonomy Team with respect to the structure • Provides recommendations for taxonomy modification based on content

26. Governance StructureRoles and Responsibilities • Technical Team: • Serves as the primary technical resource • Manages and controls Central Administration features • Is a primary point of contact for Help Desk and support services • Provides technical recommendations to the Steering Committee

27. Taxonomy Definition • Governance Definition • Benefits of Governance • Drivers • Governance Structure (4 Pillars) • Establishing a vision • Roles and responsibilities • Policies and procedures • Communications, education, and marketing • Keys to Governance • A View of What’s Next

28. Policies and ProceduresProcedures • All primary actions within an information system should be driven by policies and procedures • Guidelines will empower Content Managers and Taxonomy Team members to manage the taxonomy appropriately • Intuitive procedures will ensure the system continues to be developed consistently • Simple rules and workflows will reduce “bottlenecks”

29. Policies and ProceduresProcedures Basic workflow approval processes should be outlined for all aspects of the system & information governance

30. Policies and ProceduresTaxonomy and Content Management Simple processes should be outlined in the governance such as: • Adding a top level folder to the taxonomy • Adding a metadata field • Modifying taxonomy and metadata values

31. Policies and Procedures Sample Procedures

32. Policies and Procedures Policies • Develop policies and guidelines against the taxonomy and actions outlined in the procedures • General taxonomy and metadata policies • Policies specific to certain actions • Taxonomy creation • New navigation option • Editing the home page of the site collection

33. Policies and Procedures General Policies - SAMPLES • All folders within the taxonomy will be subject to ultimate approval by a majority vote from the Steering Committee • All crawler and filter creation must be approved by a majority vote from the Steering Committee • All folder names must be topical • All folders must be named without the use of jargon or other terminology that users would not easily understand • All folders must be named without the use of acronyms or abbreviations • All folders must be original with no overlap between content

34. Policies and ProceduresPolicies for a Specific Procedure: SAMPLE • Sample Procedure: Request New Top Level Taxonomy Node • Upon requesting a top level node, the requestor will provide: • Proposed site name • Description of use • Requirements for sub-nodes • The Steering Committee must approve new additions to top level node • All sub-nodes must be named without the use of jargon or other terminology • A new node request will not be fulfilled if it overlaps with the intended content of an existing node

35. Taxonomy Definition • Governance Definition • Benefits of Governance • Drivers • Governance Structure (4 Pillars) • Establishing a vision • Roles and responsibilities • Policies and procedures • Communications, education, and marketing • Keys to Governance • A View of What’s Next

36. Communications, Education, and MarketingDevelop a Communication Plan • Give users the ability to learn about the system and taxonomy with • One-on-one meetings • Live presentations • Documentation • Animated tutorials • White papers • Create two-way communications and prove it means something • Document decisions and archive all input • Make all feedback available to end users (card sorting) • Provide means of communication using the system

37. Taxonomy Definition • Governance Definition • Benefits of Governance • Drivers • Governance Structure (4 Pillars) • Keys to Governance • A View of What’s Next

38. Keys to Governance • Loose vs. Tight

39. Keys to GovernanceLoose vs. Tight 39

40. Case Study: Taxonomy Governance • A large government organization wanted to establish governance policies for their intranet taxonomy • A Governance Steering Committee was established and Taxonomy Team was tasked with a redesign • The governance plan outlined the training requirements for taxonomy team members and content authors • Componentized workflows were created to illustrate how the taxonomy fields and values can be added, modified, and deleted • The governance plan helped ensure the taxonomy remained relevant and current for both existing and new managers

41. Case Study: No Governance • An internal web portal for a government agency lacked a governance plan for their taxonomy • Their content was managed by two members of a web services organization with a list of over 250 top level folders • Folders were added, modified and deleted on a constant basis with no formal policies or procedures • Information management was time consuming and findability continued to deteriorate with time

42. Taxonomy Definition • Governance Definition • Benefits of Governance • Drivers • Governance Structure (4 Pillars) • Keys to Governance • A View of What’s Next

43. A View of What’s Next • As digital information explodes, organizations will recognize that governance is mandatory in order to provide quality structured information • Organizations looking to improve efficiency and reduce costs will look to governance initiatives • Privacy will come in to play with governance as more private information is replaced with electronic forms

44. Questions? Nick Nylund, + 703-739-3416, nnylund@ppc.com Joseph A. Busch, + 703-748-7215, jbusch@ppc.com http://www.ppc.com

45. ASIST Taxonomy Webinar Series • Introduction to Business Taxonomies • November 5th 11:30am-12:30pm EST • Joseph Busch and Zach Wahl • Taxonomy Workshops • November 8th 11:30am-12:30pm EST • Rachel Sondag and Jill Tabuchi • Practical Taxonomy Design • November 10th 11:30am-12:30pm EST • Jill Tabuchi and Joseph Busch • Taxonomy Governance and Maintenance • November 12th 11:30am-12:30pm EST • Nick Nylund and Joseph Busch

46. Summary • This session discussed the best practices and lessons learned regarding effective governance to manage your organization’s taxonomies over time, ensuring their effective evolution. The session detailed approaches to ensure that the taxonomy is properly maintained.