Jim Sweeney, Product Manager Synaptica LLCjim.sweeney@synaptica.com

Chaos-Control!

Enterprise Managementof Federated Taxonomies

TaxonomyBoot Camp

2012

Rules of the Game

Enterprise Taxonomy:• Centralized• Standardized Terms• Universally applied• Single Language

An enterprise taxonomy is generally synonymous with centralized taxonomy, just as federated taxonomies are generally synonymous with decentralized taxonomy.

Federated Taxonomies:• Decentralized• Specific Terminology• Conditionally applied• Multilingual

But… Rules are Made to be Broken!

What happens when we need both the efficiency and cross-searchability associated with centralized taxonomy management and the autonomy associated with decentralized taxonomy management?

Challenges

• How to allow autonomous and geographically diverse business units to use and apply their own terminology and organizational structure while maintaining some kind of universal standardization?

• How to provide for successful information retrieval from diverse disciplines and languages across all business assets?

Option A…

• In cases where it is desirable to use a single term set but apply varying hierarchical structures to those terms, one may use a multiple broader / narrower relationship class (mBT / mNT).

• The following example is taken from the TBC 2011 presentation given by Intel’s Sherry Chang, “Hierarchies & Polyhierarchies: Is More Better?”

Example

How we build it

Or we can view the distinct hierarchical structure for the Support group.

Result

We can view either the Marketing version of the hierarchy…

Pros and Cons to Approach A

• Very effective means of organizing distinct, parallel hierarchies using the same terms

• Simple to manage• Limits “taxonomies” to identical terms without

differentiation for business group, region, or language

Option B…

• A second strategy is to maintain each federated taxonomy independently and then map them together at the term or concept level.

• This method is able to accommodate multiple, disparate taxonomies and other vocabularies linked together via custom relationships.

• The resulting collections build out an ontology storing unique terms, languages, and structures as needed.

IPTC(International

PressTelecommunications

Council)

Example

Pros and Cons to Approach B

• Each federated taxonomy may be managed as an independent taxonomy

• Custom relationships may link to a “master” taxonomy and/or to one another

• Dependent vocabularies may be managed with or without hierarchical structure

• Labor intensive to manage each taxonomy independently

Using a centralized enterprise taxonomy as an umbrella to cover all concepts across the business standardizes results but limits the autonomy of individual business groups.

Option C…

While discrete “siloed” taxonomies serve independent groups within the

organization, they lack search standardization.

Discrete federated taxonomies to serveindividual business units

Mapping relationships to link upper

level concepts to “siloed” concepts

Master Taxonomy manages global concepts

Pros and Cons to Approach C

• Each business taxonomy may contain different terminology; different hierarchical structures; and greater granularity

• When “siloed” taxonomy terms are more granular than those in the upper taxonomy, more specific concepts have to map upwards to broader concepts

• This upward mapping impedes the ability to perform searches across the information assets of the business

• Striving for an Enterprise taxonomy with common language and structure is an important goal, but not always possible

• Supporting variance is an important and powerful tool

• Choose the best approach to address your organization’s unique structure and practices

• Maintain standards for taxonomy development over time to avoid further divergence

Winning Combinations

Questions?

Stop by and see us!

Jim Sweeney, Product Manager Synaptica LLCjim.sweeney@synaptica.com

Thank You!

TaxonomyBoot Camp

2012