19 oct07 avoiding the content conveyor belt trap enabling interdepartmental collaboration
DESCRIPTION
Content is created by multiple authors across the business, and then manipulated by other departments for their own use and audience. This Content Conveyor Belt may be efficient, but is fraught with risk for content accuracy and consistency. Engineering creates feature specs, used by Tech Writers to create user documentation; user guides are used by Marketing to understand how to position the product and the subtle differences between features. With each author modifying information for their own use, who is in charge of ensuring that inconsistencies have not developed from one type of document to another? If Marketing changes a feature name to avoid a similarity to a competitor, does this change get relayed back up through the conveyor belt?TRANSCRIPT
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Christie Fidura
Senior Product Marketing Manager for Terminology Solutions
Avoiding the Content Conveyor Belt Trap: Enabling Interdepartmental Collaboration
The Face of Business has Changed
Global trade is now de-facto Free-trade agreements and the internet
People are more demanding in their requirements
Immediacy is all around us Everything is faster in a non-stop world Technology is accelerating life
Internet expansion fuels digital content growth – multi channel
E-business Information publications Online support databases
Coordinating the simultaneous delivery of information in multiple languages is complex
Localized content in local language meeting local cultures
If company selling into 10 countries, 90% of content will be in the local language
Everyone speaks a different language
It’s easier to do it in “my mother tongue”
How many of you…
Are invited to development meetings?
Invite yourself to development meetings?
Bribe developers for information?
“Borrow” functional specs off the printer?
Are repeatedly asked for part/product/feature names clarifications from other departments?
Get caught up in intra-departmental wars over corporate style and terminology?
Have a 300-page style guide to follow?
Worry about the state of other documents produced by your company?
A well known dialog box …
“Use the [Alt]+[P] {…} to …”
hotkey
hot key
shortcut key
keyboard shortcut
access key
accelerator key
keyboard accelerator
The Content Conveyor Belt
Every department creates content using the same reference material
Source content is passed from one group to another
Efficiency is the Driver
One business unit containing all resources dedicated to developing one product
Process-related hierarchy
Isolates individual functions into dedicated, high performance units
Achieves maximum efficiency
It’s Efficient, but…
Each group uses the content in a different way Different formats Different delivery channels Different tone of voice
Content which was produced for internal reference only is not ready for external consumption
Content is vulnerable to modification
Inconsistencies at the source affect all subsequent documents
Chaos can result when globalization enters the picture…
The Impact of Inconsistency for Global Content
Examples: Product code name – internal name vs. marketing name
• “Longhorn” vs. Microsoft Windows Server?
Feature names
Risks to: Proprietary terms
• The business – mission statements, elevator pitches, boilerplate text
• The technology – business applications, internal processes
Editorial guidelines, which build the brand• Established/preferred nouns
• Images
• Colours
• Email Addresses
Regulatory compliance
Inconsistency Examples & Risks
New Market Realizations
“Just changing the currency symbol didn’t work too well, did it?”
“What do you mean, our translated tag offended the market?!”
“Why do we have to create the brand from scratch in this local market? Don’t they know us already?”
How Yahoo! Japan Beat eBay at Its Own Game – Business Week, 4 June 2001
eBay was late to market and relied on usual word-of-mouth for advertising -- didn’t have enough customers
eBay charged a commission per transaction -- Yahoo! Japan is free
eBay requires seller to register credit card – most young Japanese pay in cash or by bank transfer
The Business Impact
“There is no common vocabulary at Microsoft… Our lack of standardization undermines our trustworthiness.”
Craig Mundie, Chief Technical Officer
“… The customer expects to see consistent and timely information regardless of where and how it is published.”
Alison Toon, Translation & Localization Manager
“New products need to be launched simultaneously across all markets… Our quality and consistency were suffering, leading to poor communications with customers and potentially damaging the Philips’ brand.”
Luuk de Jager, Global Content Management Senior Manager
Solution: Trustworthy Computing initiative; online publication of corporate terminology; creation of Microsoft
Terminology Community Forum
Solution: One World initiative
Solution: One Face to the Customer initiative
Consistency is Key
Using consistent terms, style, formatting, and layout makes content more usable
Readers can apply existing familiarity to new content Makes them more comfortable
Reduces learning curve
Happier customers think your product is better
Less Support queries
Internal perception = Great documentation!
The Real Impact of Inconsistency
Inconsistencies cause: Inability to reuse content
Inability to leverage other internal knowledge
Inability to leverage existing translations
Inability to Simship across all markets
Frustrated customers
Increased Support issues
Internal and External Perception = Bad documentation
We communicate with customers over
multiple channels
Brand Penetration
Customers can easily spot
inconsistencies between
channels
The Result of Inconsistency?
Ineffective communications
Inaccurate messaging
Lack of cultural/local knowledge
Brand perceived negatively
Product/service/offering fails
Today’s Solutions for Managing Consistency
Current best practice methods
Content Management Systems (automated)
Style guidelines manuals and websites (automated)
Training (human)
Ad hoc review (human)
But consider…
Increasing logistical difficulty of managing a global web presence
Multiple CMS and other repositories
Multiple editors, languages and locations worldwide
Utilizing the power of local knowledge
• Empowerment with enforcement
• A framework, not a strait jacket
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Centralization = Communication
Today’s Communication Challenges
Increasing delivery channels Too much work to deliver/track
Increases risk of errors
Decreases content effectiveness
Increasing content volumes Does ‘write once, reuse many times’ ever work?
Higher translation costs
Time-to-market pressures Production cycles are shortening
Squeezes development & localization effort
Source issues Don’t have access to all content sources required – no transparency
Dependency on subject matter experts – busy and/or located elsewhere
Today’s Communication Challenges
Content ownership Lost after publication
Leaves content vulnerable
Pressure to: Improve customer satisfaction
Improve quality and consistency
Accelerate time-to-market
Do more with less resource
Business silos of content creation Geographically separated resources
No ability to share information or leverage other work
Content Creation Challenges
Business silos of content creation
Resources are separated
General lack of ownership across the organization Terminology and content
Pressure to do more with less
Change is difficult No budget
No visibility
Process is lengthy
Style guides are not integrated into business workflow Interrupts work
What Bridges the Business?
Create a Foundation of Communication
All communication is built on terminology
Terms are a company’s greatest asset: Impart knowledge Create a market presence Provide competitive differentiation
They describe unique selling points Just Do It – Nike iDrive – BMW Out-of-Office Assistant – Microsoft Outlook
Terms enable collaboration without hassle “Managing our terminology means that the CEO, a secretary at a repair depot and
a PR agency all use consistent, correct and approved terms.”-- Giesecke & Devrient
You Can Drive this Collaboration
You may normally feel unempowered to suggest/execute change
But, you have natural abilities: Special skills
• Wordsmithing
• Collaboration
Natural curiosity
Design abilities – a good eye
Access to internal resources scattered across departments who share your frustration
Begin a grass roots effort to encourage collaboration of information
Create an Information Foundation that can benefit all
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A Case Study
Giesecke & Devrient
150-year-old banking institution
Specializes in high-tech hardware and software for banks Currency automation, electronic payment systems, IT safeguards
2 languages Source = German
Each product assigned to individual silo Engineering to Quality Assurance to Tech Writing
One Translation Department 1.7 million words annually
The Problem
“Each time we started working on a new document, we found a new name for something or a different way to describe it than before.”
References: 8 Word/Excel lists
Spare parts database
Inconsistencies in these references
Project delivery dates (and sanity) were suffering
The Solution
Centralized the documentation teams Each writer was assigned to his own core competency to maintain expertise
Incorporated Translation department into this group Internal collaboration achieved
Centralized corporate terminology into a singular system Accessible to everyone in the organization
Enabled quantification for how much each term costs for translation
Standardized on a term management system where all term info and translations can reside
Pushes correct term to translator during translation process
Streamlines workflow
The Benefits
“We no longer have to continually double-check terminology. 30 seconds per term in a 300-page manual with 2 or 3 questions per page can add up to another day’s work.”
Inter-departmental collaboration enabled Engineering began consulting the term system for new feature names Use of corporate-approved naming conventions
• 4,000+ movable parts – saved time and effort
Cleansed German source language – increased customer satisfaction
Unified style and language – increased customer satisfaction
Combining multiple word lists – decreased overall number of terms Eliminated duplicate and unapproved terms 20,000+ terms today
“It helped us collaborate across a wider variety of topics and fields within the company.”
Managing Terminology Delivers…
The Right Term to the Right Author at the Right Time Delivers accurate and effective communications
Rapid time-to-market
Consistent information, communications, global branding and messaging
The Right Term to the Right Translator at the Right Time Delivers true translation efficiency
Reduces translation costs
Reduces the review cycle
Consistent translations, higher quality
More reuse
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Thank you
Christie [email protected]
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