Karen Brothers has spent more than 15 years in various technical communication roles within the software, consulting, healthcare, and manufacturing industries. She has managed technical content projects from design through delivery, identifying objectives and key metrics, developing content plans, and selecting tools and media for publication and distribution. As a Content Management Specialist at 3M, she plays a key role in the company’s transition to structured authoring and its implementation of component content management by evaluating tools and developing measurable processes to optimize re-use, increase efficiencies in content publication, and improve the customer experience.

Down the Rabbit Hole We Go! Adventures in Connecting Silos in a Content Wonderland

“Content silos are everywhere, their existence extending well beyond the divide commonly seen among business entities within in a large corporation or between marketing and technical teams within a single business or portfolio. Even technical content can have its own silos, with specific content types or roles spread across specialized teams.

A technical content team at 3M is working to connect its content silos. The team has implemented solutions that 1) streamline the flow of content between authors and reviewers, 2) scale to meet the needs of teams within the businesses it supports and beyond, and 3) help authors and subject matter experts improve the usefulness and consistency of content.

In this session, Lewis Carroll’s Alice will lead us on an adventure to learn more about 3M’s experiences in connecting content silos. So, let’s go – the rabbit hole awaits!”

In this session, attendees will learn:

• How to shift from content authoring to “content services”
• How to provide impact and value to content authors and measure the results
• How to gain support and buy-in for new initiatives