10 steps to salvation: Creating digital governance that works
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For organisations to succeed in the digital age, they need to adopt new frameworks and ways of working. The key to doing this is to dust off and turn inside-out existing governance frameworks, reinvigorating them with more nimble ways of working. Governance is no longer a separate policy or individual decision maker. It is everyone working in digital. It is every digital touch point and policy. It is the digital strategy, the customer strategy, the media strategy, the KPI framework, analytics, and SEO. Twenty-first century governance is the supportive mesh of digital success. Presented 01 Oct 2014 at Confab Europe Barcelona http://confabevents.com/events/europe/program/10-steps-to-salvation-creating-digital-governance-that-works
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10 steps to salvation: Creating digital governance that works
- 1. 1 0 STEPS TO SALVATION: CREATING DIGITAL GOVERNANCE THAT WORKS C O N FA B E U R O P E 2 0 1 4 K AT E T H OMA S
- 2. What weโll cover โข The governance problem โข What does good governance look like? โข 10 steps to achieve this
- 4. Governance is your life raft Processes People Technology
- 5. Without it youโre lost. Enterprise web governance ensures the proper stewardship of an organizational web presence. Lisa Welchman
- 6. Old style governance โข Fixed world of wires e.g. big mainframes, expensive technology suites โข Online was owned by the IT department โข Early online publishing not dissimilar to print โข Transferring old governance frameworks made sense
- 7. The governance group hug! people tech process This is digital This is governance
- 8. Disruption! Challengers! Start-ups! 1998 2000 2005 2003 2005 2006 2009 2010 2010
- 9. And new ways of doing everything
- 10. New world order Everyone is a publisher.
- 11. The digital-content-governance group hug! tech content process people This is digital This is governance
- 12. The digital-content-governance group hug! tech content process people This is digital This is governance
- 13. Alas, failures of governance abound. Some tell tale signs of inattention to governance: โข Not everyone is on board the digital train โข Poor documentation and format โข No clear process for sign-off or approval โข No shared understanding of managing non-standard requests
- 14. With an impact on people building digital Crazy workflows! 1. Request to web team 2. To and fro with client 3. Upload to CMS 4. Screenshots of CMS preview 5. Copy into PPT 6. Add narrative showing interaction 7. Regs & Compliance review 8. Two-week turnaround 9. Back to web team 10. Upload to live
- 15. And trying to use it x x
- 16. Why is this happening? No-one wants content to be wrong. Or sets out to work crazy hours via a dumb workflow. So whatโs the problem?
- 17. Itโs because the frameworks in place donโt work. Theyโre: โ outmoded โ focused on print โ not agile โ typically convoluted
- 18. Governance needs a facelift โข Focus is analogue, not digital โข Websites are is now the shop front: donโt make it hard for people to see in โข This is all new; businesses didnโt have to do this 10, 15 years ago โข They now have to do their job AND do digital
- 19. How do we need to think differently about governance? โข Itโs not what it used to be โข Governance isnโt a document, a committee, a gatekeeper โ Itโs a new way of working โข Twenty-first century governance is the supportive mesh of digital success
- 20. What does digital governance mean to content? โข It means content and context is mapped, prioritized and understood โข Teamwork! โข Content is โ On-brand, correct โ Compliant โ Accurate โ Measurable and working hard
- 21. What does good governance look like?
- 22. Digital governance: scope Technology and operations CMS set up, database configuration, infrastructure Joiners, leavers, movers Local ownership and control, training, access management Workflow Support requests, change requests, automated approval Content Content governance: the heart of any governance framework โข Text Sourcing, writing, translating, adding, editing, removing โข Images Picking images โ library or photo shoot? Formats, sizes โข Metadata & tagging Technical details count! โข Tone of voice Itโs not just what you say, itโs how you say it โข Visual style Stay on-brand: ensure the site perfects personalised experiences โข Content management Keeping people and systems in sync โข Analytics Your compass of truth
- 23. Governance framework Global Steering Guidelines Planning Tools Optimization Global steering committee Global KPI framework Agency (and inter-agency) management Global guidelines Local guidelines Global / local content calendars Tactical planning Content updates Digital asset manage-ment Evaluation Optimization Content distribution Processes / people Software / tools Documents / policies Analytics
- 24. Example of a digital-content workflow Set-up Planning Sourcing Formatting Editing Creation. Reviewing and publishing Monitoring Removal
- 25. And digital content deliverables Content plan Content KPI framework Approval principles Content briefs Editorial guidelines Content templates
- 26. 10 steps to salvation
- 27. 1. Strategy โข Start by defining a plan and a common vision for the organisation โข Align digital with strategic business goals โ User centred strategy โ User centred content โข Have an entrepreneurial information leader
- 28. 2. People: youโre lost without leadership โข Your executive must be on board โ If the head honchos donโt get digital and live and breathe the vision, youโre wasting your energy โ nothing will ever happen โ Your CMO and CTO must get on โข CMOs will spend more on tech by 2017 than CIOs do now โข If youโre in a leadership role, employ the right people: trust them to do their job
- 29. 3. Tech โข Hardware, servers, software, systems are tools โข Tech doesn't have to be big โข Start small, prove your principles, grow
- 30. Follow the leaders Start small, prove your principles, grow Like the Hearst corporation โข Hearst magazines uses WordPress to power their (corporate) website
- 31. 4. Spring clean! โข By now you know โ what youโre trying to achieve (strategy) โ whoโs leading on it (people) โ the tools youโll need (tech) โข Now itโs time to get rid of the dead wood โ Small teams โ Smart work practices โ Begin as you intend to continue: itโs happening โ itโs no longer a project; it is/will be, your reality
- 32. 5. Content โข Not all content is the same โ Learn to spot the difference โ Use insight to learn whatโs important to your users โข A content strategy frames all activity; no (strategic) ticket, no start โ You need a content vision, to prevent a whole world of wrongness
- 33. Just askโฆ
- 34. Who are all losing market share to digital disruptors
- 35. 6. Workflows โข Workflows map dependencies and lays circuits that link relationships โ Remove friction โข Design them to be inclusive, nimble, empowered, empathetic, smart โข Build with muscle and power so you can pull the plug before itโs too late
- 36. Great work flows = productivity! Lessons from the public sector: โข Transparency helps accountability โข More at stake than the bottom line โข Long term vision โ efficiencies of investment in research, policy over decades โข Shared cultural understandings
- 37. Reflowing the workflow Crazy Perfectly sensible workflow 1. Request to web team 2. To and fro with client 3. Upload to CMS test server 4. Send link to test site to Regs & Compliance for review 5. One-week two week turnaround 6. Back to web team 7. Upload to live
- 38. Reflowing the workflow Crazy Perfectly sensible workflow 1. Request to web team 2. To and fro with client 3. Upload to CMS test server 4. Send link to test site to Regs & Compliance for review 5. One-week two week turnaround 6. Back to web team 7. Upload to live
- 39. 7. Corridor chats โข Letโs get social: colleagues and higher ups โข Create a framework everyone understands โข Engineer corridor chats with decision makers to keep the wheels oiled โข Harness all resources you can: sell digital!
- 40. 8. Your audience โข Itโs time to check in with the people paying your salary: customers, students, clients: โข Is your governance framework working for them? โข When they need to do something with you, to find that phone number to keep their lights on, are you helping them? โข Is governance supporting the strategy, which is supporting users/customers
- 41. 9. No rest for the wicked โข Not resting on your laurels: โ Test always with data against smart benchmarks โ How effective is digital? โ How much have you spent? โ Are people reading/doing/acting on your products? โ Are you joined up. โ What needs to change? โ Whatโs working, whatโs not? โข Everything today is measurable: make this a fundamental part of your framework
- 42. 10. Yoga time โข Be agile, nimble, flexible โข Youโre not locked into anything โข You need to be future prepared โ Future proofing, but without the expectation of perfection; you donโt know whatโs coming, so set things up to be ready to move
- 43. 10 steps 3. Tech 2. People 1. Strategy 10. Yoga 9. Data 7. Corridor chats 6. Work flows 5. Content 8. Audience 4. Spring clean
- 44. Take aways
- 45. Takeaways 1. Content - the heart and lungs of digital; governance - the muscles/ligaments and central nervous system 2. Content strategists must own governance and lead the conversation
- 46. Takeaways 3. Governance applies across the content lifecycle; itโs not a checkpoint before launch 4. Embrace the new way of working in digital โ give governance a hug
- 47. Thank you
- 48. Acknowledgements! A big thank you to Alex Papageorgiou for her hand-drawn graphics. (She saved you from death by PowerPoint and my slides from looking very boring indeed.) And for ongoing inspiration, to members of the DigitasLBi content strategy team, past and present.
Editor's Notes
- Content is at the heart of digital. And all of a sudden, the relationships that map contentโs relationship and context become more important than ever.
- Without governance, content and digital falls apart.
- Failures of governance abound. Here are just a few indicators that governance has been neglected. Not everyone is on board. This is from the leadership and executive down through management and to staff. For example, in my job, an all too common scenario is that a company has asked DigitasLBi to help them transform their business so itโs digitally viable. Typically, this request comes from the executive who have bought into the idea and recognise the need for digital transformation. But they forgot to sell their plans internally. Or make structural changes necessary to help transformation. So when I come in and deal with clients who are a few rungs down in the organisation, theyโre not prepared, equipped or empowered to work properly with us Poor documentation: confusing requests in systems or documents that are hard work to use. Constraints of format that create duplicate content Sign-off procedures and workflows that have not been adapted or modified to keep up with realities of digital publishing. And panicked emergency publishing instead of something thatโs expected, resourced and planned for. Not to mention you have no way to way to keep track of investment or have confidence that digital is on track.
- How does this then play out? Not happily. Failures of governance are no fun for anyone. For example, for people working in digital. One client I was working with had a convoluted approval system for updates to the website because of an inflexible regs and compliance department. This meant that every time the web team updated a product page, before they could publish, they copied the CMS preview of newly-built pages to PowerPoint, wrote a narrative showing how people interacted with the new content, and sent to the Compliance Team for sign-off. Who had a two-week turnaround on approvals. This was at a large multinational company operating, as all do, to some level or another, within a regulatory framework. So requests from the web team were frequent. And the web team was subsequently unnecessarily overworked and stressed.
- If people building the site are stressed, letโs pause and think about the hapless reader looking for help/advice/information/something to buy. http://www.webpagesthatsuck.com/worst-websites-of-2012.html http://www.futuro-house.net/page3.html This is the story of an energy company providing emergency phone numbers for people whoโs power had cut out in bad weather. There was a handy link on the home page to a content page in Help and support with the numbers people needed. This page was great for people: it had a clean design, was uncluttered, the information easy to read and the emergency numbers accurate. Marvellous. Cold shivering person was able to find the information they needed quickly, make the call with the last of their battery power. Two weeks later, they lost power again. But this was isolated, not widespread so the energy company didnโt think enough people were affected to warrant a home page link. So person goes to home page, but with no link, thereโs no easy way for them to find the page again. They recall it was in Help and support, so choose that. And sees Emergencies in the nav and finds a page here that they *think* is right. โฆ. Unfortunately, once the link dropped off the home page, there was no way people who needed this information could find it again. The page they could find, sensibly still sitting there in Help and Support, was cluttered and not entirely accurate. So findable, but not particularly readable. These poor publishing practices also led to an overworked web team, whoโd gone to the effort of creating a new page instead of updating the existing. But the biggest impact? The customer using the last of their mobile phone battery power to get the power back on who canโt find the help they need.
- Itโs not because governance isnโt considered. Every organisation we work with has a governance framework
- Because itโs the internet. The internet has sucked power out of the centre and given it to us. Great for customers โ we now all walk around wrapped in digital blankets. Never away from our phones. Always checking in. Or checking out. And now expect and demand businesses to keep up. Business might have thought five, 10 years ago that they needed a website. So did that. But they now need to do much more. But how joined up is it? And is your web content you? Is it what you want it to be? Does it reflect YOU? Weโve seen in scenario 1 that there is a process; itโs just outmoded. It doesnโt reflect the new reality of digital publishing.
- Because governance isnโt a document, a committee. Itโs a new way of working. Itโs a framework that letโs people get on with their day-to-day reality, but with the assurance that time is well spent because itโs joined up.