Session 02: Deciding Parameters

Hey hey! Welcome to this session of the Content Review Decision Tree project (what a mouthful!) where I am developing a tool that determines when Cryptiquest content needs to be reviewed and at what capacity. In the last session, the project was defined and a plan was formulated. In this session I will design the solution and if there’s time, draft the introduction.

Let’s start by reviewing the project definition.

The goal of the project is to create a decision tree for determining what type of review process is required for Cryptiquest content.

The ideal solution would be a decision tree or a series of “case statements” that would succinctly identify the proper protocol for clearly defined parameters for project updates.

This solution would live on the projects site under a menu item called “Tools” for easy retrieval.

This project seems pretty straightforward. I will need to identify the types of review capacity options and the parameters in which those capacities would be okay.

Various notes from Content Review Decision Tree Session 01: Kick-off

Here is what I think the order of operations should be:

1. Identify review process for natural tiers of capacity
2. Suss out the content parameters that would warrant a change in tier
3. Organize the findings into a algorithmic structure

Review Tiers

The review process now follows this pattern:

1. Internal Review
2. Target Audience Analysis
3. Content Preparation
4. Confidant Review
5. Confidant Feedback Edits
6. Second Draft (2D) Group Review
7. 2D Feedback Edits

It seems that the natural groupings here for review tiers is as follows:

1. No Support
   1. Internal Review
   2. Target Audience Analysis
2. Confidant Support
   1. Content Preparation
   2. Confidant Review
   3. Confidant Feedback Edits
3. 2D Support
   1. 2D Group Review
   2. 2D Feedback Edits

It also seems that Target Audience Analysis step is the perfect time to use the Content Review Decision Tree that we’re developing here.

Deciding Parameters

To explore this, I’m going to start by looking at the extremes: No Support vs. 2D Support. I’ll figure out Confidant Support after.

Here is a list of the types of content Cryptiquest typically creates:

• Session notes
• Retrospectives
• Social media posts
• Newsletters
• Press Releases
• Project Content
• Project Updates

That’s about it, I guess. What’s striking is that that I should probably have an editor look over some of this content before it goes live (looking at you Newsletters). That would be a different category than Confidant Support and 2D Support. That would be Proofread Support – a whole new grouping to the review process.

There’s another factor that’s not mentioned here: intended audience. The audience is separated between internal and external. Let’s look at the list again and try to categorize each item by intended audience.

• Session notes – INTERNAL
• Retrospectives – BOTH
• Social media posts – EXTERNAL
• Newsletters – EXTERNAL
• Press Releases – EXTERNAL
• Project Content – BOTH
• Project Updates – BOTH

Zooming in on the content types that have been categorized as “BOTH” (internal and external audiences), the Retrospectives are about 75% intended to be internal as they help identify flaws within the internal process. They are also intended to help external audiences see a potential pathway toward completing the same project on their own.

Project content and updates are categorized as internal or external if the project is for internal or external purposes. For instance, a project to write a short story might be 99% intended to be for an external audience while a project to create a “How to Write Stories” guide will be 50/50 internal and external while a project to create “Cryptiquest’s Objectives for Stories and Other Media” will be 99% intended for an internal audience.

Perhaps I should categorize project types based on intended audience mix:

• Internal Audience (e.g. Company-specific standards)
• Mostly Internal Audience (e.g. Non-Project Management Guides)
• Split Audience (e.g. Project Management Guides)
• Mostly External Audience (e.g. Crafting Tools)
• External Audience (e.g. Media)

Retrospectives, which are not projects, fall into the Mostly Internal Audience category.

So the first factor is the Intended Audience Range (IAR). But that’s not enough to determine what review tiers are needed for content. Let’s analyze groupings for each of the IAR categories.

• Internal Audience
  • Certain Projects
  • Certain Project Updates
  • Session Notes
• Mostly Internal Audience
  • Certain Projects
  • Certain Project Updates
  • Retrospectives
• Split Audience
  • Certain Projects
  • Certain Project Updates
• Mostly External Audience
  • Certain Projects
  • Certain Project Updates
• External Audience
  • Certain Projects
  • Certain Project Updates
  • Social Media Posts
  • Newsletters
  • Press Releases

Looking at the Internal Audience section, there are Projects, Project Updates, and Session Notes. Session Notes are definitely in the No Support tier (perhaps they ultimately shouldn’t be but for now they are). Projects and Project Updates are not. Just because a project is mostly for an internal audience does not mean that external audiences won’t see or experience the product. That’s why I noted them to be 99% Internal a few paragraphs back. While session notes are intended to be informal, projects that are for an internal audience are less so and perhaps that’s the next factor? I’ll continue with the other IAR categories then loop back to tackle project updates.

With the Mostly Internal Audience section, in addition to projects/project updates, there are Retrospectives. While I don’t think Retrospectives require Confidant Support or 2D Support, I do think they should have Proofread Support. I’m not exactly sure what that entails yet but for now I envision paying someone on a gig site to take a lookie-loo over the Retrospective and provide surface-level edits. I think projects in this category would benefit from 2D Support (in addition to Confidant Support) but the target audiences for these projects will be niche. Projects would also require Proofread Support. As far as the difference between Retrospectives and projects, formality does have something to do with it but more prudent is how Retrospectives are not about conveying a concept while projects are. In fact, that’s the same difference between Session Notes and Projects in the previous IAR section. Session Notes and Retrospectives report information while Projects try to influence action or emotion. Not sure how to measure that activity. Influence? Imparting? Usefulness? Affect? Contextualization? What word describes how something is internalized? Internalization? Purpose? Depth? I think Depth works for now (information storage is shallower than how-to guides which are not as immersive – ah. Maybe that’s the word!) Immersion is now the new factor I’m looking for.

The only other IAR category that has multiple types of content is the External Audience. In this category, in addition to projects / project updates, there are social media posts, newsletters, and press releases.

Projects at this level would be very immersive, social media posts would be somewhat immersive, newsletters would be less immersive and press releases are even less immersive than newsletters. Let’s look at these in list form an analyze for patterns:

• Very Immersive – Media (e.g. stories, games, etc.)
• Somewhat Immersive – Social Media Posts, Crafting Tools
• Less Immersive – Newsletters, Guides, Retrospectives
• Not Very Immersive – Press Releases, Standards, Session Notes

Hmm… not really seeing a pattern. Maybe if I put in a grid of Immersion vs. IAR Category?

	Not Very	Less	Somewhat	Very
Internal	Company Standards, Session Notes
Mostly IN		Other Guides, Retrospectives
Split		PM Guides
Mostly EX			Crafting Tools
External	Press Releases	Newsletters	Social Media	Media

I’m not sure “Immersion” was the right factor since there’s no good way to group which content should be supported by which tier. In fact, it looks more like formality was correct to begin with. What would that table look like?

	Informal	Formal (Informative)	Formal (Conceptual)
Internal	Session Notes		Company Standards
Mostly IN		Retrospectives	Other Guides
Split			PM Guides
Mostly EX			Crafting Tools
External		Social Media, Newsletters, Press Releases	Media

Okay. This looks workable. If the content is formal, it needs to have Proofread Support, if the content is Formal/Conceptual, it needs to have Confidant Support, and finally, if the content is Formal/Conceptual for Mostly Internal audiences to External audiences, then it needs to have 2D Support.

Before we are finished though, how are project updates tackled? How much of an update requires support of any kind?

I’ll analyze that in the next session.