DATA CATEGORIZATION YOU CAN LIVE WITH

Presented by Monica Crocker, CRM, PMP

Speaker Introduction and Session Overview

• Speaker• Session Overview– Define Data Categorization – Describe a Data Categorization Development approach– Discuss some “gotchas”

• What does Data Categorization mean to you?

Why Do You Care?• Because others care: Information Security, Privacy,

BCP, Users, Compliance, Auditors, etc.• Information is only useful if findable• Categories can be applied at different levels:

enterprise, division, application, table, field• Full text searching doesn’t work • Consistency is critical to system and process integrity

Data Categorization and Taxonomy• Taxonomy = A system of classifying things based on their

relationships; often from more general to more specific• Data Categorization = A way to categorize content

(classification)• Together = A way to get to information• Note: Data = Information• Information = Structured and Unstructured

Ways to Categorize Information• By level of risk: critical, confidential, public• Subject – requires a robust cross-reference of synonyms/preferred

terms/related terms and doesn’t support information security and retention requirements

• Organizational – doesn’t hold up to re-orgs or support cross-functional content and processes

• Functional – supports information security and retention requirements and is intuitive

• A hybrid of the last two, with subject incorporated into metadata, may be the best

Other Related Terminology• Metadata – Data about data, or in this case, information• Index values – the actual metadata values associated with a particular

item• Key words – user defined values in a keyword field or search terms used in

a full text search• Text mining – using a statistical inventory of the full contents of a library of

items to define common terms• Auto-classification – using analysis of the text and metadata associated

with content to automatically assign index values to it, particularly classification values

Good Metadata/Classification Criteria• Should support all the governance needs for it• Should describe the content itself, within its context • Should allow users to search with the information they

already have• Should be enough metadata to identify each item uniquely

AND NO MORE• Should be immutable (not change over the life of the item)• Should be intuitive/understood by a novice

Things to Avoid• Folders• Team member names (except in the Author field)• Status fields• Due dates (work triggers)• Technology specific terms (“PDF” files)• Duplicating data from another system• Too many labels

Model Development Process• Define scope…how will the information be used and

by whom? What policies and regulations apply?• Gather Subject Matter Experts/Stakeholders• Start with your Business Classification Scheme or

Functional Hierarchy• Determine any system limitations• Research existing (prebuilt) models

Model Development Process: Enterprise-wide

Collect all existing organization models including: Records Retention Schedule, Organizational Charts, Security classifications, Information inventories, Budget, File plans, Business process documentation

Build Model• Determine how it will be documented• Build a thesaurus • Figure out how to handle items that don’t fit – create

new category or categorize as “other”• Decide if you will supplement it with folksonomy

(keywords, comments) or tagging• Define ongoing responsibilities

Implement Model• Test– Can users find what they need to do their jobs?– Does everything fit?– Can you apply policy/regulations?

• Modify• Implement• Update and Review – REGULARLY

http://info.aiim.org/2017-state-of-information-management

Handout Exercises1. Put the items on your list into groups and name the

groups. And come up with a name for everything together.

2. Pick one of your groups and define fields someone might use to find items in that group (maximum of 10).

3. Review your results – anything you want to change?

Conclusion• It’s just another big standardization project

with potential for significant impact on business productivity

• It requires varied SMEs• Questions?

• monica.crocker@wellsfargo.com • @rec_rocker