Guiding Others Through the
Maze:
Working with Stakeholders to
Build a Taxonomy
Theresa Putkey
Information Architect
Copyright (C) Key Pointe Usability
Consulting, Inc.

What We’ll Cover
• How to help people in a taxonomy
workshop
• Continuing to build knowledge while
building the taxonomy
• Teaching others about the maintenance
process
Copyright (C) Key Pointe Usability
Consulting, Inc.

Taxonomy Workshop
• Beginning, middle, end
• History on taxonomy
• Metadata vs taxonomy
• Process
• Who it is for
• Maintenance
• Give real life examples (think Zappos,
Amazon,
REI)
Copyright (C) Key Pointe Usability
Consulting, Inc.

CBC
Copyright (C) Key Pointe Usability
Consulting, Inc.

CBC
Archives
Copyright (C) Key Pointe Usability
Consulting, Inc.

Amazon
Copyright (C) Key Pointe Usability
Consulting, Inc.

Not Able to Do a Workshop?
• Go over the
central ideas with
the client one on
one or one on two
• It’s important to
give them
examples that
they can explore
on their own.
Copyright (C) Key Pointe Usability
Consulting, Inc.

Building a Taxonomy
• Don’t hold out till
the end!
• Review and iterate
frequently.
• You’ll get valuable
feedback
• You’ll be able to
demonstrate how it
works.
Copyright (C) Key Pointe Usability
Consulting, Inc.

Enlist the Client
• To build parts of the
taxonomy. This way
they can learn as
you go along.
Copyright (C) Key Pointe Usability
Consulting, Inc.

Maintaining the Taxonomy
• When the client starts
making appropriate
revisions to the
taxonomy, that’s
when you know they’ll
be able to maintain it
on their own.
Copyright (C) Key Pointe Usability
Consulting, Inc.

Like Usability Testing
• It’s important to remember that others
don’t understand taxonomies like we do,
but they are the ones that will need to use
them.
• If the client doesn’t understand the
taxonomy, it’s because we haven’t
explained it well enough or we haven’t
structured it properly.
Copyright (C) Key Pointe Usability
Consulting, Inc.

Summary
• Recommend a workshop, if possible. If
not, then go over the principles one-on-
one.
• Continue to reinforce these ideas by
getting reviews early and often to help
reinforce taxonomy principles.
• Someone understands the principles when
they start reviewing it and modifying it
accurately.
• Do what works for the client.
Copyright (C) Key Pointe Usability
Consulting, Inc.

Contact Info
• 604 563 6317
• tputkey@keypointe.ca
• www.keypointe.ca
• @tputkey