Taxonomy Change Management

Taxonomy
Change
Management

Matt Johnson
SLA Annual Meeting
Chicago, Illinois, USA
18 July 2012

© Copyright 2012 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved. 1

What’s this about?
Many sources of
information on how to
create taxonomies;
fewer on how to manage
taxonomies once created
Taxonomy management
platforms typically don’t
account for business
processes


Who’s it for?
Focus on large
enterprises
Tools and best practices
can be applied in many
settings


Who are you?
• Program Manager,
Information Standards,
eServices, EMC
• Computer hardware and
software manufacturer
• B2B space
• Fortune 500
• ~54K employees around
the world

• Formerly lead
taxonomist for Microsoft
field sales and marketing
portal


Agenda
Overview: survey of working taxonomists
Developing change management processes
Establishing service level agreements
Engaging and training stakeholders
Using tools to support management processes


Agenda


Survey of working taxonomists
Conducted via SurveyMonkey,
March 2012
Promoted to a global audience
via Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn
groups (notably TaxoCoP, SLA
Taxonomy Division, regional
SLA chapters)
55 individual respondents
5 high-level questions about
taxonomy management
practices in their workplaces


Agenda


Why business processes?

Most taxonomists don’t work alone.


Minimize input
channels
Avoid reinventing
the wheel
Avoid hearsay
Avoid duplication
of effort



The taxonomy will last longer than you will.


Business
processes
are
dynamic.


Business
processes
are
dynamic.

Expect them
to change as
new
requests are
made.


Integrating with existing data and workflows

Unnecessary in an ideal world,
but most of our worlds are far from ideal.



Taxonomies often
dependent on large,
complex data
infrastructure with its
own processes
Each part of the process
known to relevant
stakeholders, but no
overall insight



User research techniques
for identifying existing
processes:
– Interviewing
stakeholders
– Observation


Agenda


What’s an SLA?
A negotiated agreement between taxonomy
consumers and taxonomy managers
Records a common understanding about services,
priorities, responsibilities, and guarantees
Commonly includes:
– definition of services
– performance measurement (metrics)
– problem management
– consumer duties
Need not be highly formal


What’s the value of an SLA?
Setting expectations with
consumers
Setting expectations with
management team
When there is
disagreement, SLA is an
artifact which can be
referenced
Typically requires
collection of metrics


Why are metrics useful?
Tracking to meet established
SLAs
Identifying heavy consumers,
taxonomy growth areas
Identifying processes which
can be improved or discarded
Estimating team capacity
Making a case for resources
(money, tools, staffing) to
meet need


Agenda


How many stakeholders?


Who are the stakeholders?


Identifying stakeholders
Audiences you need to
engage to be successful
– Content authors and
publishers
– User experience designers
– Developers (front- and
back-end)
– Site/repository owners
– Subject matter experts
(SMEs)


Keeping them engaged
Emphasize value
and relevance to
what they care
about
Frame introduction
and use of the
taxonomy as simply
as possible
The “what” is less
important than the
“why”


Keeping them engaged
Winning advocates and promoters
The personal touch: face-to-face, phone, email
Establish clear communication channels
Establish SLAs and meet them consistently
Educate as you go
Other methods
– Documentation (internal/external, processes/applications)
– Live/computer-based training sessions
– Social media


Agenda


What tools are commonly used?


Pros and cons: word of mouth
• Immediacy and transparency
Pros • Ease of explaining complex
issues in person

• Not easily used by larger,
Cons distributed teams
• Not captured in metrics
• No audit trail
• No opportunity for
oversight

Fully 1 out of 5 respondents rely on word of mouth for some part
of their request management


Pros and cons: email
• Everyone already has it and
Pros uses it

Cons • Timely response not
guaranteed
• Mechanisms for oversight
limited
• Metrics, audit trails hard to
derive
• Vulnerable to corruption
and loss

Most commonly used (2 out of 3 respondents)


Pros and cons: separate tracking tool
• Ease of oversight
Pros • Ease of use by distributed teams
• Ease of extracting metrics, audit
trails

• Separate from taxonomy manager
• Need for training on tool, procedures
Cons • Limited accessibility, transparency for
consumers
• Big investment in addition to taxonomy
manager

Bug trackers, task managers, CRM, etc.


Pros and cons: taxonomy editor
• All the information you need in one
Pros place
• Ease of oversight
• Ease of use by distributed teams
• Ease of extracting metrics, audit
trails

Cons •
•
Expensive
Technically difficult to implement
and support
• Limited accessibility, transparency
for consumers

Many, though not all, taxonomy management platforms
incorporate a work queue


All tools have pros!
• Discussion is
indispensable, provided
it’s also documented
somewhere
• Email is useful for
timely answers to
specific questions posed
by a small audience
• Most taxonomists are
using multiple tools in
conjunction with one
another


Summary
• You’re not in this alone
• Set expectations, back them up with data
• Know your audience, keep them motivated
• Know the right tool to use for the job


We’re looking for
a few good:
• UX designers a taxonomist
• Usability
engineers
• Search architects
• Metadata mavens

EMC


Taxonomy Change Management

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