Planning for Successful Implementation of Content Optimization Software

1. Fourth & last of our series: “Your Content, Only Better” October 25, 2012 Planning for Successful Implementation of Content Optimization Software PG Bartlett, Acrolinx

2. – Thomas Ernest Hulme “Language is by its very nature a communal thing; that is, it expresses never the exact thing but a compromise – that which is common to you, me and everybody.” http://www.thinkexist.com

3. Agenda Project Result Roles & Responsibilities Project Phases & Milestones Potential Pitfalls About Acrolinx

4. Project Result • Acrolinx software installed on: • Your server(s) • Your users’ desktops • Spelling, grammar & style configured to your requirements • Terminology database with your key words & phrases • Training for all roles • Quality reports (baseline & incremental)

5. How About DIY? • No; you need specialized skills to: • Modify style rules -> customize style and grammar • Set up terminology in Acrolinx • Train users • Acrolinx offers “10-10-10” services package • 10 days of services • 10 customized rules • 10 weeks to completion • Suitable for most implementations

6. So why bother with this webinar? This webinar explains: • What to expect • How to optimize your results • What to avoid Keep in mind: key issues are organizational, not technical

7. Roles & Responsibilities

8. Roles • Project Sponsor • Project Manager • Terminologist • Linguistic Administrator (“ling admin”) • Server Administrator • Writers & editors

9. Project Sponsor • Role • Approves commitment to project – typically director or VP • Understands business reasons for project • Activities • Participates in kickoff meeting • Participates in acceptance meeting

10. Project Manager • Skills • Ideally has formal PM background (e.g., PMI) • Knows importance of schedule, scope & costs • Knows importance of avoiding “scope creep” • Activities • Monitors project schedule • Monitors & controls risks • Coordinates your resources • Communicates, communicates, communicates • Participates in every milestone meeting • Available for daily involvement in project Tip: this role can be outsourced – which may work better for you.

11. Terminologist Tip: give authority to at most 3 people to avoid deadlock & delays. • Skills • Typically editor or writer • Activities • “Validates” terminology – enters terms, creates links from “preferred” terms to “deprecated” terms • Needed for 10-20 hours per week during project • Must be available to manage ongoing terminology changes • Can serve as Linguistic Administrator too Tip: identify controversial terms early & use separate process to resolve. Tip: can outsource initial terminology validation. Tip: without links, Acrolinx won’t flag deprecated terms.

12. Linguistic Administrator Tip: role of linguistic administrator can be outsourced. • Skills • Typically an editor • Knows corporate style guide(s) • Should understand grammatical syntax • Activities • Works with writers to test rules • Organizes feedback on rules (working with project manager) • Makes requests for customizing rules • Can serve as Terminologist too

13. Server Administrator • Skills • Typically IT person familiar with servers • Could be database administrator, but not required to be • Activities • Installs software on server and desktops • Handles updates to software & configuration files during implementation • Performs software upgrades • Should be different than Linguistic Administrator or Terminologist

14. Project Phases & Milestones

15. Project Phases & Milestones • Identify requirements & business objectives • Assess feasibility • Develop SOW (Statement Of Work) • Prepare data for Acrolinx analysis • Kickoff meeting • Initial development • Training • Testing iteration 1 • Testing iterations 2 & 3 • Acceptance Before contract After contract

16. Identify Requirements & Business Objectives • Roles • Key stakeholders within your organization • Acrolinx sales team – initially • Acrolinx Professional Services (PS) – later on • Activities • Discussions with your team • Results • Implementation team understands your requirements, which is needed so they can provide guidance and assess feasibility & scope Tip: this step is key – make sure discussionsare sufficiently detailed.

17. Assess Feasibility • Roles • Acrolinx PS • Activities • Compare requirements to product capabilities • Results • Acrolinx PS agrees that product can meet requirements

18. Develop SOW • Roles • Acrolinx PS • Activities • Develop scope, schedule & resource requirements • Results • SOW including acceptance criteria Tip: “acceptance criteria” determine when project is finished.

19. Prepare Test Data • Roles • Project Manager • Others as needed • Activities • Gather broad range of documents to support later testing • Results • At least 1 GB of content Tip: Acrolinx can protect your content under NDA.

20. Kickoff Meeting Tip: if people are missing, risk increases. • Roles • Everyone • Activities • Review roles & responsibilities • Review phases & milestones • Review business objectives • Review project objectives • Discuss potential risks • Results • Everyone understands how the project supports the business objectives • Everyone understands level of effort required for success • Everyone understands what Acrolinx does (and doesn’t do) Tip: must understand differences between terminology and linguistic rules.

21. Tip: key roles can learn more about their activities at the Acrolinx InfoCenter. http://infocenter.acrolinx.com

22. Tip: Change Management • Identify communication required for each stakeholder • In particular, focus on negative stakeholders; consider: • 1-on-1 communication • Additional training • Separating from rest of group • Make sure you communicate stakeholder experiences to Acrolinx PS • We often see easy-to-fix problems • You may think those problems are unavoidable

23. Tip: Governance • Governance = structure for agreeing on style, tone of voice, terminology, processes • “Content Quality Review Board” • “Center of Excellence” • “Community of Practice” • Link governance to business objectives • Find executive sponsorship for governance structure • Establish governance structure at start of project

24. Initial Development • Roles • Acrolinx PS • Activities (5 days) • Perform content analysis • Produce initial quality reports • Produce initial software delivery • Results • Initial version of Acrolinx ready to test • Baseline quality reports for future comparisons Tip: while development is under way, set up your server hardware.

25. Training Tip: you need ALL of the right people available for training. • Roles • Acrolinx PS • Authors & editors • Linguistic Administrator, Terminologist • On-site support (to install software on desktop & connect to server) • Activities (1-3 days) • Acrolinx PS trains all types of users • Requires access to live software • For XML content, Linguistic Administrator needs extra training • Results • Your team using Acrolinx Tip: you should have a detailed test plan prepared in advance.

26. How do you measure Acrolinx performance? • “Precision” problems = false alarms • “Recall” problems = missed alarms • 100% Precision = no false alarms • 100% Recall = no missed alarms Tip: 100% is impossible to achieve for almost any rule.

27. Testing Iteration 1 • Roles • Linguistic Administrator • Authors & editors • Activities (2 weeks) • Authors & editors provide feedback on precision & recall • Linguistic Administrator reviews feedback, develops requests for rule changes, prioritizes those requests, enters requests into Acrolinx project management system • Results • Requests for creating or customizing rules • Acrolinx PS processes requests, delivers updated software Tip: make sure you agree on how to submit feedback. Tip: make sure you process the feedback. Tip: make sure rule changes are critical to support business objectives.

28. Meanwhile: What Your Terminologist Does • Responsible for “Terminology Validation” process • Process steps: • Identify terminology that needs to be managed • Existing term list • “Harvesting”: extraction from existing documents or translation memory • Categorize terminology based on “domain” (typically needed when multiple groups with different needs use Acrolinx) • Assign status to terminology: “preferred” or “deprecated” • Link each deprecated term to its preferred replacement • Process begins during implementation, continues indefinitely

29. Meanwhile: What Your Project Manager Does • Tracking progress against schedule and objectives • Comparing Acrolinx checking results to success criteria • Comparing system performance to project objectives • Ensuring new requirements support business objectives • Running user surveys (supported by Acrolinx PS)

30. Testing Iterations 2 & 3 • Roles • Linguistic Administrator • Authors & editors • Activities • Ongoing usage of Acrolinx, reporting of problems, prioritizing requests for customizing rules • Results • Acrolinx PS delivers another software update at end of each iteration Tip: Acrolinx PS knows which rules bring the key benefits.

31. Acceptance • Roles • Everyone • Activities • Final testing • Final user survey • Results • Signoff on project Tip: acceptance criteria cannot require 100% precision & recall.

32. Potential Pitfalls

33. #1 Problem: Communication Failures • Either: • People who want information aren’t getting it • People are giving information that’s not received • Establish how EVERYTHING will be communicated • To avoid confusion, avoid depending solely on email • Some people cc: everybody, which reduces clarity of who’s responsible • That’s why Acrolinx runs project management software and gives you access

34. Scope Creep • Adds risk to any project • Judge critically whether scope changes: • Support business objectives • Can be postponed to later phase • Priority rankings • Business priorities • User priorities • System priorities

35. Implementing Low-Priority Rules • Most benefits come from top 10 rules • Each additional rule delivers diminishing returns • We’ve seen rules that are never triggered

36. Terminology Do’s and Don’ts • Don’t use Acrolinx term extraction unless you must • Start with term lists you’ve already built • Don’t make initial terminology list too big • Don’t try to put ALL of it in up front • Don’t over-commit your resources • Do include stakeholders early & throughout • Do agree on a clearly defined workflow • Who can contribute terminology? • Who reviews terminology? • Who gives final approval? • Do set up workflow early

37. Not Monitoring Progress Against Schedule • Project Manager must remain vigilant • Must remain aware of project status against milestones • Must make sure resources are available when needed

38. Not Considering Risks • Complex technical environments • Project roles that are unclear or unfilled • Project objectives that don’t align with business objectives • Geographically distributed teams • Political misalignment

39. Summary • Good project management practices apply • Especially change management • Good judgment comes from experience; experience comes from bad judgment • Seek out help with relevant experience • Roll out when you’re ready • Too early, too many false alarms, too much user resistance • Too late, overly perfected, other priorities may intrude & derail

40. Acrolinx Overview

41. Acrolinx Overview Technology developed by Acrolinx team at German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence Spun off in 2002 to develop software that helps write better content Privately owned Berlin headquarters, offices in U.S. & Japan Linguistic competence in English, Chinese, German, Japanese, French, Swedish

42. Everyone can access terms How Does it Work? Managers can view status & results Acrolinx works within editing tools Acrolinx checks content against rules & terms Set up rules & terms Set up users & systems

43. – John Stuart Mill “Language is the light of the mind.” http://www.thinkexist.com

44. Professional Services • Help companies plan and execute their global content strategy • Create and modify all types of content • Writing, instructional design, editing, illustration, production, codingproject management • Assist with Acrolinx deployments and configuration • Customer-side project management • Terminology validation • Rule validation • Custom training • Change management

45. Contact Information Write. info@contentrules.com Talk. +1 408-395-8178 Search. www.contentrules.com Read. www.contentrules.com/blog Tweet. @contentrulesinc

46. Follow-Up • Contact info: pg.bartlett@acrolinx.com • Future webinars • Philips Healthcare, Tuesday, November 6; sign up now at http://www.acrolinx.com (look for link under “Join us”) • My next webinar: December 5 – subject TBA • Recording & slides will be posted soon at http://www.acrolinx.com/webinars_en.html

47. Thank You! PG Bartlett pg.bartlett@acrolinx.com