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The purpose of this paper is to share personal experience on the early stages of taxonomy construction, reflecting on the potential role of contextual classification techniques as applied by the records management profession as a tool in effectively organising information, resources and services within intranet and/or portal environments. The paper also aims to assess the additional benefits to be secured where linking content to business purposes can create or reveal new meaning.

The paper draws on experience, personal opinion, published literature and discussions with peers to assess the applicability of contextual classification as a tool to support taxonomy development.

The paper concludes that classification of information, resources and services within intranet and/or portal environments using a citation order of function, activity, task, sub‐task is likely to be of significant value, requiring further investigation to fully assess impact and applicability. Contextual classification receives much discussion in general records management terms, however its applicability in supporting portal and/or intranet development appears to receive little attention. The requirement to generate improvements in information retrieval from a host of on‐line services (of which taxonomy development is one example) is reinvigorating the role of the informational professional. Given the criticality of improving the management and retrieval of information it is desirable that stronger interdisciplinary links are established across the information profession to further develop “information retrieval” as a subject discipline.

The article suggests that the role of contextual classification to organise information, resources and services within intranets/portals requires further investigation and reflection to assess its applicability, value and impact. Initial findings and reflection of the application of contextual classification in the design of elements of a university portal taxonomy have proven to be successful, suggesting that wider discussion and reflection is now required. It is also suggested that the information profession take steps to build stronger interdisciplinary links to advance the development of information retrieval as a subject discipline.

Due to various historical differences in organising, documenting and managing information across cultural institutions, cross‐domain resource discovery in the cultural heritage sector remains problematic. Leveraging on the lessons learnt from current efforts to enhance access to networked digital cultural resources, this paper seeks to explore the development of a taxonomy for the same purpose.

A methodology was developed for the construction of a 500‐term taxonomy for a Singapore‐based cultural heritage network. Based on this taxonomy, the benefits and problems of developing such a knowledge organisation system for a cultural network are also discussed.

Collecting terms and concepts from various external and internal sources was sufficient to kick‐start the taxonomy development process. One of the key aspects of the Integrated Museum and Archives System (IMAS) taxonomy is its ability to show a broad overview of the all the resources held by the National Heritage Board, regardless of originating institution.

No single scheme currently best fits the needs of cultural networks, but all can benefit from each other's learning process. The development of the IMAS taxonomy particularly benefited from the insights provided by faceted classification and the possible relationships between terms and concepts in ontology. Such guidelines and recommendations also provide much ground and basis for the NHB to start a framework for standardising documentation practices.

This study used the Delphi technique with 31 seasoned leadership educators who, over the course of two rounds, were tasked to categorize the level of complexity of 60 leadership competencies. What resulted was a five-tier taxonomy based on the level of complexity of each of the 60 competencies assessed. The taxonomy also includes four categorical clusters of similar competencies and three domain levels of instructional design. A description of the Delphi technique, results of the study, the taxonomy model, and methods for employing the model are described.

Potential and benefits of classification schemes and thesauri in building organizational taxonomies cannot be fully utilized by organizations. Empirical data of building an organizational taxonomy by the top‐down approach of using classification schemes and thesauri appear to be lacking. The paper seeks to make a contribution in this regard.

A case study of building an organizational taxonomy was conducted in the information studies domain for the Division of Information Studies at Nanyang Technology University, Singapore. The taxonomy was built by using the Dewey Decimal Classification, the Information Science Taxonomy, two information systems taxonomies, and three thesauri (ASIS&T, LISA, and ERIC).

Classification schemes and thesauri were found to be helpful in creating the structure and categories related to the subject facet of the taxonomy, but organizational community sources had to be consulted and several methods had to be employed. The organizational activities and stakeholders' needs had to be identified to determine the objectives, facets, and the subject coverage of the taxonomy. Main categories were determined by identifying the stakeholders' interests and consulting organizational community sources and domain taxonomies. Category terms were selected from terminologies of classification schemes, domain taxonomies, and thesauri against the stakeholders' interests. Hierarchical structures of the main categories were constructed in line with the stakeholders' perspectives and the navigational role taking advantage of structures/term relationships from classification schemes and thesauri. Categories were determined in line with the concepts and the hierarchical levels. Format of categories were uniformed according to a commonly used standard. The consistency principle was employed to make the taxonomy structure and categories neater. Validation of the draft taxonomy through consultations with the stakeholders further refined the taxonomy.

No similar study could be traced in the literature. The steps and methods used in the taxonomy development, and the information studies taxonomy itself, will be helpful for library and information schools and other similar organizations in their effort to develop taxonomies for organizing content and aiding navigation on organizational sites.

The main objective of the paper is to assess selected taxonomy building tools to review their features and capabilities for supporting development and deployment of taxonomy functions.

A checklist of desirable features and capabilities of taxonomy tools was used for assessment focusing on development, deployment, display, and information environment supported. White papers and product information datasheets on vendor sites were consulted to analyze features and capabilities of selected taxonomy tools.

The review indicates that more than 50 per cent of the selected tools support automatic and hybrid taxonomy building; about 80 per cent allow import and export of taxonomies and vocabularies; and all tools reviewed support classification and tagging. User interfaces, for maintenance, and display in facets, are supported by some tools, while, some have also integrated other visualization tools, or modules to provide clear representation of contents, and relationships.

Analysis is based on review of white papers and product information sheets and is therefore limited to indication of availability features and capabilities. The review does not assess performance of tools which would require use of tools and feedback from actual users.

The checklist used for assessment provides a useful template for organizations interested in assessing tools for taxonomy implementation. A summary of features and capabilities of selected taxonomy tools may also be useful in selecting tools for taxonomy application projects.

Little research has been reported in the literature on assessment methodology and evaluation of taxonomy tools. This study makes a good contribution to the literature on this important aspect of research and makes available useful practical information as well.

The purpose of this study is to develop and validate a taxonomy useful for classifying the training activity preference patterns adopted by executives and for describing how these patterns relate to important workplace measures. Although many organizations hold that well-trained and developed leaders are important for organizational success, little is known about the patterns of self-developmental activities that such leaders choose to initiate and how such training impacts organizational outcomes. Understanding these patterns may be useful in characterizing leaders in terms of training interest and showing a relation between executive training and valued organizational outcomes.

Using a sample of 4,624 senior executives who completed a training activity and attitude survey, cluster analysis was used to derive a five-type training and development (T&D) taxonomy. Types varied by training activity pattern/attitudes and the proportion of well-trained and less-well-trained executives in each agency were described. The researchers collected an independent sample of employee perceptions of engagement and leader effectiveness and number of equal employment opportunity (EEO) complaints within each agency.

Organizations with higher concentrations of well-trained/developed leaders tend to have employees with more favorable workplace attitudes and higher regard for senior leaders and generate smaller proportions of EEO complaints.

Data were collected from 2011 and 2012, government leaders were sampled, and outcome analyses were conducted at the agency level rather than at the individual level.

A link between leader training and organizational outcome is useful for promoting and justifying such training to stakeholders.

Characterizing leaders by training pattern will be useful in examining training usage/interest and in crafting programs tailored to leaders of different patterns.

An executive training pattern taxonomy is unique in the literature and evidence linking such training to outcome is rare.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the potential for eXtensible Business Reporting Language (XBRL) to go beyond static reporting. A taxonomy structure of information is developed for providing a knowledge base and insights for an XBRL taxonomy for integrated reporting (IR).

Design Science (DS) research, as a pragmatic exploratory research approach, is embraced to create a new “artefact” and thematic content analysis is used to analyse IR in practice.

Using XBRL for IR allows a shift from static and periodic reporting to more relevant and dynamic corporate disclosure for stakeholders, who can navigate and retrieve customised disclosure information according to their interest by exploiting the multidimensionality of IR and overcome some of its criticisms. The bi-dimensional taxonomy structure the authors’ present allows users to navigate disclosure from two different perspectives (content elements (CE) and capitals), display specific themes of interest, and drill down to more detailed information. Because of its evidence-based nature and levels of disaggregation, it provides flexibility to preparers and users of information. Additionally, the findings demonstrate the need to codify sector-specific information for the CE, so that to direct the efforts toward the development of sector-specific taxonomy extensions in developing an XBRL taxonomy for IR.

The limitations of DS research are, first, the artefact design and, second, its effects in practice. The first limitation stems from the social actors’ perspective taken into account to develop the taxonomy structure, which derives from the analysis of the reporting practices rather than a pluralistic approach and dialogic engagement. The second limitation relates to the XBRL taxonomy development process because, since the study is limited to the “design” phase being codification and structuring the knowledge base for an XBRL taxonomy, there is a need to develop a taxonomy in XBRL and then apply it in practice to empirically demonstrate the potential and benefits of XBRL in the IR context.

The taxonomy structure is targeted at entities interested in designing an XBRL taxonomy for IR. This is a call for academics and practitioners to explore the potential of technology to improve corporate disclosure and open up new projections for resurging themes on intellectual capital (IC) reporting with prospects for IC “fourth-stage” research focused on IC disclosure.

This is an interdisciplinary research employing the DS approach, which is rooted in information systems research. It is the first academic study providing pragmatic results for using XBRL in the context of IC and IR.

This research project aims to provide a new visual representation of the Artefacts Canada digital collection, as well as a means for users to browse this content. Artefacts Canada Humanities is a database containing approximately 3.5 million records describing the different collections of Canadian museums.

A four‐step methodology was adopted for the development of the faceted taxonomy model. First, a best practice review consisting of an extensive analysis of existing terminology standards in museum communities and public web interfaces of large cultural organizations was performed. The second step of the methodology entailed a domain analysis; this involved extracting and comparing relevant concepts from terminological authoritative sources. The third step proceeded to term clustering and entity listing,which involved the breaking‐up of the taxonomy domains into potential facets. An incremental user testing was also realized in order to validate and refine the taxonomy components (facets, values, and relationships).

The project resulted in a bilingual and expandable vocabulary structure that will further be used to describe the Artefacts Canada database records. The new taxonomy simplifies the representation of complex content by grouping objects into similar facets to classify all records of the Artefacts Canada database. The user‐friendly bilingual taxonomy provides worldwide visitors with the means to better access Canadian virtual museum collections.

Few methodological tools are available for museums which wish to adopt a faceted approach in the development of their web sites. For practitioners, the methodology developed within this project is a direct contribution to support web site development of large cultural organizations.

Corporate reporting infrastructure and communication are being transformed by the emergence of digital technologies. A key element of the digital accounting infrastructure underpinning international corporate reporting is the IFRS Taxonomy, a digital representation of international accounting standards that is required by firms to produce digital corporate reports. The purpose of this paper is to trace the development, governance and adoption of the IFRS Taxonomy to highlight the implications for accounting practice and standard-setting.

The authors mobilise Actor Network Theory and a model of transnational standardisation to analyse the process surrounding the formation and diffusion of the IFRS Taxonomy as a legitimate “reference” of the IFRS Standards. The authors trace the process using interview, observation and documentary evidence.

The analysis shows that while the taxonomy enables IFRS-based reporting in the digital age, tensions and detours result in the need for a realignment of the perspectives of both accounting standard-setters and taxonomy developers that have transformative implications for accounting practice and standard-setting.

The study explains how and why existing accounting standards are transformed by technology inscriptions with reflexive effects on the formation and diffusion of accounting standards. In doing so, the paper highlights the implications that arise as accounting practice adapts to the digitalisation of corporate reporting.

The purpose of this paper is to explore theoretically and empirically the understanding and implementation of an information taxonomy in the UN organization World Food Programme (WFP) by analysing users’ information behaviour and by establishing a minimum set of cross-silo metadata (taxonomy).

The study implies the use of both qualitative and quantitative methods. This includes desk review of key documents and interviews with information architecture staff from various WFP units; data collection carried out as semi-structured staff interviews in WFP; log analyses of search log-files from WFP intranet portal (WFPgo) from September to November 2013, the results were applied and a suggested taxonomy tested at workshops conducted for the staff in headquarters.

The results reveal an organization with a high demand for easier access to information and knowledge, greater internal collaborations and stronger links with various sources of knowledge. Staff participating in the various workshops pointed out that work processes as well as the human resources component cannot be left out of a solution development.

There has been little research carried out on current taxonomy projects in corporate environments and international emergency response organizations and few has touched on how knowledge organization systems can enhance or constrain staff’s ability to access online content.