Category: Knowledge Management

Bite sized taxonomy bootcamp

Posted by on in Knowledge Management, Taxonomy

Techniques, tips and tools for taxonomists and knowledge managers.

Our very own Noeleen Schenk spent an excellent afternoon listening to taxonomy experts and practitioners from around the world, including Canada, USA, Germany and the UK – at the recent bite sized Taxonomy Bootcamp.

This virtual event, held this March, included three compelling case studies from taxonomy professionals presenting how they have put taxonomies into practice within their organisations to make their information more accessible and findable.

Our top three takeaways 

1) How to introduce taxonomies and ontologies
Taxonomist & Information Architect, Fran Alexander, revealed tips to explain taxonomies and ontologies and their benefits to stakeholders. She suggested looking at stakeholders as personas to help craft your story to best suit your audience and ultimately drive buy in and project support.

2) Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Accessibility (DEIA) metadata
Erica Hornung, an Insights & Analytics Associate talked about DEIA metadata, and how organisations need to consider what DEIA metadata is applied in order avoid marginalising identities. She also shared best practices how taxonomy and metadata can better reflect the needs of diverse audiences.

3) Climate change taxonomy
Thomas Bahr, Knowledge Management Officer, United Nations, presented the climate change taxonomy created for the United Nations Climate Change. With over 60,000 official and unofficial documents on their website, he revealed how they developed a taxonomy made up of 12 different facets and 3,226 terms to organise their documents by topic, conference/sessions, keywords and country to support findability as well as joining up climate change information both inside UNCC and with external bodies.

Explains Noeleen: “These online practical sessions are a great way to hear real life challenges, top tips and success stories around the use of taxonomies and how they can facilitate findability, research and discovery for all types of business. I’m really looking forward to the next session soon!”

Whether you are new to taxonomy; perhaps struggling to explain taxonomies to budget holders; or even a seasoned professional seeking tips, look out for other bitesize online bootcamps taking place in 21 June 2023 and 11 October 2023. 

Sharing our knowledge with Information Managers of the future

Posted by on in Information Management, Knowledge Management, Metataxis CompanyLeave a comment

Metataxis is pleased to be invited to contribute to the continuing development of knowledge and information leaders. The City, University of London Department of Library and Information Science (or CityLIS for short) provides one of the most well-regarded courses on library and information science in the UK and we are please to be given the opportunity to contribute. Our director Noeleen Schenk has donated her time to CityLIS in order to share her expertise on knowledge management. Noeleen will be in excellent company, delivering a joint lecture with Ian Rodwell, Head of Client Knowledge and Learning at Linklaters.

The delivery of the joint lecture has become something of an annual event. Metataxis have contributed to the information management course at CityLIS for a couple of years now, and it is something we look forward to each year. Making that connection between academic learning and practical application is important, ensuring graduates emerge from courses better prepared for real-life information management challenges. Noeleen and Ian will be delivering a lecture that focuses on knowledge management theory with a strong focus on practice and technique.

Noeleen’s understanding of knowledge management theory and practice has been extremely useful for us when working with clients. Having a knowledge management background can be helpful in many obvious, but sometimes unexpected ways.

If you want to know more about how you can leverage these methods to improve information management, or just want a general catch up about knowledge management use the contact form on the right.

Get the tools to future proof your business

Posted by on in Information Management, Knowledge Management

Our Director Noeleen Schenk is presenting at the Federation of Small Business event Get the Tools to Future Proof your Business.

The FSB have created this event to help small businesses plan for reopening after lockdown. “As you reopen your business and look to the future make sure you have all the tools to hand to make the most of opportunities as they arise. This event will talk you through some top tips on how to ensure you have all the information you need at your fingertips to ensure you can take the most successful decisions for your business“.

Noeleen will be talking to members about how looking after your information is not just the preserve of larger organisations, but also vitally important for small businesses, and can help them protect their business from unexpected shocks.  The presentation will focus on what they need to consider, in small practical steps. 

Join Noeleen and and Federation of Small Business on Wednesday 19 May 2021, from 10:00 – 11:00. Book here for the online event.

Metataxis now on G-Cloud 12

Posted by on in GDPR, Information Architecture, Information Governance, Information Management, Knowledge Management, SharePoint

Metataxis are pleased to announce that public sector organisations can again access our services through the latest G-Cloud 12 framework.

Cloud services, such as O365/SharePoint Online, require careful planning, design and governance to be successful; however all too often this is just seen from a technical perspective rather than one based on the information and the user.

Metataxis can help organisations meet these information management and information architecture challenges that make the difference in being able to support long term adoption and deliver real value.

Metataxis offer a number of services on the G-Cloud:

  • Information Governance & Assurance
  • Information & Knowledge Management Strategy
  • Content Migration Services
  • GDPR Compliance Services
  • Information Architecture Services
  • Information Discovery Services
  • Information Management Services

    If you would like any further information then please contact us.

    • Metadata, taxonomies and retrieval – an ISKO event

    Posted by on in Information Architecture, Information Management, Knowledge Management, Metadata, Ontology, Taxonomy

    On Friday April 5th I was lucky enough to attend the ISKO event Metadata, taxonomies and retrieval, which was held at City, University of London after the ISKO AGM. After introductions by ISKO chair David Haynes, 4 very different speakers covered a range of topics, all around the theme of metadata, taxonomies and retrieval.

    Getaneh Alemu opened with a detailed look at how he and the library team at Solent University have improved discovery across the library catalogue, using his four main principles of quality metadata. Building on his PhD work, Getaneh outlined the four overarching metatdata principles for successful search: metadata enriching, linking, openness and filtering. Using these principles as guides, he has been able to analyse user search patterns and inform more efficient cataloguing practices at Solent.

    Next we heard from Cancer Research UK’s Taxonomy Manager, Thomas Alexander. Thomas has led the development of a system-agnostic single taxonomy at Cancer Research UK, creating a common language across the whole organisation. This single taxonomy is shared across their external website, internal SharePoint site, and IT helpdesk services. While this common vocabulary has made finding information easier across the organisation, it required several stages of user testing and validation, and is slightly restricted by SharePoint functionality in some cases. Thomas hopes that having the solid taxonomy established will be a great place to start any future ontology projects he has in mind.

    After a refreshment break, Niké Brown presented around taxonomy challenges in digital publishing. Niké has many years’ experience in this field, and even remembers her former company launching their first ever CD-Rom, a format and content challenge that helped launch her particular interest in this topic. We were taken through several examples of different approaches to digital publishing taxonomies, and the challenges faced by each. Several points were raised linking to the previous presentations, around the pros and cons of one large, all-encompassing taxonomy vs. multiple smaller, specialist taxonomies, and the importance of proper metadata enrichment.

    The final speaker was Eugene Morozov, who talked about W3C Semantic Web standards and discoverability of regulatory rulebooks. Eugene went over some of the pros and cons of Model-Driven Machine Executable Regulation (MDMER), and the benefits this developing field could have in the future. Building on the 5-star Open Data rating scheme, Eugene provided examples of various regulations and rated them accordingly, including an axis of granularity and an axis of semantic richness to provide a fuller picture.

    The audience was then invited to ask questions of the 4 speakers in a panel discussion, addressing the questions Metadata and Taxonomies: best hidden behind the scenes, or fully exposed to users? All speakers had different experiences of both these approaches, and all ultimately agreed it depended on context. There was a consensus around the importance of having enough information for users to be able to narrow down their search, help with ambiguous search terms find related terms etc, without providing an overwhelmingly large full taxonomy. Some interesting points were then raised around AI and machine learning, as well as voice search and how taxonomies will apply and be available for voice search results. All panellists believed the most important thing regardless of the approach adopted is having high quality taxonomies in place.

    Overall it was a thoroughly interesting afternoon, with some great speakers and thought-provoking questions. I look forward to the next ISKO event! https://www.iskouk.org/events