THE GOLDILOCKS APPROACHFINDING THE RIGHT PROJECT AND THE RIGHT TEAM AT THE RIGHT SIZE

EDWINA LUI INFORMATION ARCHITECT

KAPLAN PUBLISHING

THIS IS KAPLAN.

Kaplan, Inc.

KHEC KU KPE

Kaplan Higher Ed

KUK

KI

Grad Health Pre-College Bar

Kaplan Test Prep

Kaplan Publishing

And this is KPUB.

“TRADITIONAL” PRINT & LMS WORKFLOW

LAN

Content Creation (Word)

Editing (Word/

InDesign)

Typesetting (InDesign)

Digital Publication

(EPUB)

Print Publication

Google Docs

TemplateLMS Authoring Tool

LMS Student Homepage

Legacy Content

(InDesign)

ADAPTING TO CHANGE

• physical classrooms to online courses

• printed materials to print-and-digital bundles

• comprehensive courses to customizable, mix-and-match offerings

• paper-and-pencil to ubiquitous mobile devices

TOO BIG: THE ECMS + UCM

ECMS + UCM: THE GOAL

+ =

CCMS

DAM

+ UCM

Current Content Model

KHE KTP

KPUB

Content

PHASE I

1. sunrise CCMS, DAM, and authoring tools

2. develop UCM v1.0

3. research (confirm assumptions about) • current systems • current models • legacy content volumes

4. research workflow requirements

PHASE II

1. ingest legacy content

2. update UCM v1.0+

3. develop publishing pipelines

4. train users on new workflow(s)

ECMS: THE PLAN

“Power User” Authoring

Tool

“Daily User” Authoring

Tool

CCMS

DAM

Pub. Pipe-lines InDD, PDF,

EPUB, etc.

LMSLMS

LAN

LMS

Legacy Content

LMS Au. Tool

Student Home-page

LMS

LMS Au. Tool

Student Home-page

LMS

LMS Au. Tool

Student Home-page

LMS

ECMS: END OF PHASE I

LMS Au. Tool

Student Home-page

LMS

LMS Au. Tool

Student Home-page

LMSLMSLMSLMSLMS

LMS Au. Tool

Student Home-page

LMS

LMS Au. Tool

Student Home-page

LMS

“Power User” Authoring

Tool

“Daily User” Authoring

Tool

CCMS

DAM

Pub. Pipe-lines

LMS Au. Tool

Student Home-page

LMS

InDD, PDF, EPUB, etc.LAN

LMS

Legacy Content

Phase I 90% completed (except for deployment of fully integrated “daily user” authoring tool)

Phase II scaled back to a single business unit only

ECMS + UCM: OUTCOME

PROJECT FOCUS

1.

2.

UCM: FROM PROPOSAL TO V1.0

became

KPUB Model

KTP Model

KHE Model

KPUB Model KTP Model

KHE Model

New Stuff

SURVEYING THE CURRENT LANDSCAPE

breadth depth

A CLEAR BUSINESS NEED

Q: Do you have a business need to facilitate easier sharing of content with other Kaplan business units?

KINC: Yes!

KTP: No.

KHE: No.

KPUB: Maybe?

ECMS + UCM: TOP-DOWN CHANGE

KINC

KUKHEC

KHE

KPUB

KTP

BarPCGrad Health

TEAM MAKEUP

PRIORITY LEVELS

1. differing levels of expertise by participants

2. unclear participant roles: consultation vs. active development

3. lack of empowerment within respective BUs

4. inability to accurately anticipate impact of next phase

(DON’T) BOIL THE OCEAN

TOO SMALL: INTERACTIVE IBOOKS

INTERACTIVE IBOOKS: THE GOAL

brainstorm

design develop

release

Legacy Content

User Feedback

INTERACTIVE IBOOKS: THE PLAN

LAN

Content Creation (Word)

Editing (Word/

InDesign)

Typesetting (iBooks Author)

Widget Dev

(Javascript)Print

Publication (PDF)

Digital Publication

(iBooks)

Typesetting (InDesign)

Content Conversion

(DITA)

Digital Publication

(EPUB)

PROJECT FOCUS

INTERACTIVE IBOOKS: ISOLATING CHANGE

KINC

KUKHEC

KHE

KPUB

KTP

BarPCGrad Health

3 interactive iBook products brought to market

5 additional titles 80% developed, but not released

Project discontinued

INTERACTIVE IBOOKS: OUTCOME

A CLEAR BUSINESS NEED

Q: Do you have a business need to develop interactive eBooks?

KPUB: Yes!

KTP: No.

A CLEAR BUSINESS NEED

Content Creation (Word)

Editing (Word/

InDesign)

Typesetting (InDesign)

Content Conversion

(DITA)

Typesetting (iBooks Author)

Widget Dev

(Javascript)Digital

Publication (EPUB)

Print Publication

(PDF)

Digital Publication

(iBooks)

DISCOVERING PAIN POINTS

Terje Rakke, “Female Hurdler Bislet Stadium, Norway”

TEAM MAKEUP

=

Deborah Parkin, “isolation”

TEAM MAKEUP

=

TEAM MAKEUP

=

TEAM MAKEUP

=

JUST RIGHT (?): HTML AUTHORING

HTML AUTHORING: THE GOAL

HTML Authoring Tool

Legacy Content

Newly Authored Content

PDFsXMLeBooks

HTMLPrint Books

HTML AUTHORING: THE PLAN

LAN

HTML Authoring Tool

Content Creation

Content Editing

EPUB Creation

InDD Typesetting

Print Publication

LMS Au. Tool

LMS Student Homepage

LAN

LMS

Legacy Content

PROJECT FOCUS

+

ADDRESSING REAL PAIN POINTS

v1v2

v3

WYSIWYG

TEAM MAKE-UP

TEAM MAKE-UP

PROS & CONS OF ADOPTING AN EVOLVING TOOL

– users may expect a defined end, or have higher expectations sooner

– frustration with an “unfinished” tool or workflow

+ issues uncovered early in the tool’s evolution can be addressed iteratively

+ users feel empowered to guide pace and direction of change

HTML AUTHORING: TURNING USERS INTO CHANGE AGENTS

KINC

KUKHEC

KHE

KPUB

KTP

BarPCGrad Health

REGULAR COMMUNICATION WITH USERS & STAKEHOLDERS

daily office hours

weekly remote & in-person stand-ups

monthly demos

quarterly stakeholder updates

ongoing chats & documentationUser Guide

6-month pilot completed with 40 titles’ worth of content ingested to the platform

30+ users trained

3 major output formats tested and proven

Shortened timeline for digital-only product

Platform licensed for 3 years with additional content teams being on-boarded each quarter

HTML AUTHORING: OUTCOME

WHAT DID WE LEARN?

Do Don’tAlign project goals to actual business

needsBuild towards an aspirational

requirement only

Conduct regular and targeted two-way communications with all stakeholders

Deliver information and updates as a coda

Put users first! Design around a technology, no matter how cool it might be

Continually address user pain points, no matter how trivial

Place all newly-raised issues in a parking lot to avoid changes in scope

Promote change agents from within groups of end users

Manage change from above

Have internal users roll up their sleeves and get hands-on sooner

Outsource development and support tasks to avoid disrupting internal

resourcesresources

Edwina Lui edwina.lui@kaplan.com