Taxonomies
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economics
finance : globalization : poverty : regulations : sustainability : trade environment
agriculture : animals : climate : construction & building materials : environmentalism : food & drink : nature
: raw materials : restoration : water
healthcare
disabilities : disease : epidemics : genetics : management : medical research : nutrition : pharmaceuticals : treatment : wellness
industries
arts
: biotechnology : clean technology : communications : energy : financial services : life sciences manufacturing & materials : media : mining (new) : retail : transport : travel
lifestyles
consumption
: design & engineering : education : families : fashion : homes : leisure : values organization
anticipation : change : competition : culture : innovation : metrics : processes : risk : sales & marketing : strategy : workforce
: workplace
politics
government : ideologies : international : military : protest : rights : security
society
community: crime & justice : demographics : gender: generations
: networks technology
computing : electronics : intelligence : internet : nanotechnology : realizations : robotics : science : singularity & transhumanism : space
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Figure 29. Taxonomy
Using a taxonomy (a knowledge classification system) such as STEEP (Social, Technology, Economy, Environment, Politics) or PESTLE (Politics, Economics, Social, Technological, Legal, Environment) provides you with a starting point for your scanning. If,
for example, your scanning anchor is around technology and learning, you will need to search out hits related to different aspects of the issue – delivery, communication, networking, etc.
Figure 29 shows a typical, but comprehensive, taxonomy. Your scanning is likely to be limited to maybe 1015 topics from this list or others that are specific to your organization.
Using various ways to classify your data through structured, centrally managed, and classified topics (taxonomy) or by unstructured, distributed, unclassified topics (folksonomy) helps identify the valuable information and to filter out considerable noise.
Figure 30. An unstructured folksonomy displayed in a Wordle tag cloud