The Evolution of Sun's AnswerBooks		Table of contents		Indexes		SGML in Transition

Haakonstad Norma

Cost Justifying Your SGML Project

Introduction

We often hear that "information is our company's most important asset." As writers, editors, managers, and engineers, we are responsible for converting "information" from its intangible state to a tangible form that can be packaged and sold. "Information" is the raw material we use to build our information products.

Our day-to-day activities and the tools we use are part of a complex information production process. Many of us are responsible for finding ways to improve the production processes currently in use, reduce production costs, and add more value to the products we deliver to our customers. To achieve these goals, we are continually looking for ways to apply new management practices and advancements in technology.

In the past, the delivery of our products was fixed and predefined. It was fairly certain that the output of any production process we defined would be in printed form. Any tools we purchased and processes we implemented were optimized for single-purpose data creation and paper deliverables. Because these tools and processes have been with us for some time, we have come to feel comfortable with them.

The products we produce today can take the form of a printed manual, CD-ROM, on-line database, electronic browser, or a WWW page. New delivery tools are being developed at a faster rate than ever before and increased exposure to electronic products has raised customer expectations about what features our products should contain. This is forcing us to re-examine the tools and processes we currently have in place.

Many companies are challenged with creating information that is easily and cost effectively used in a variety of publication formats. Improving the efficiency and effectiveness of our processes is an essential factor in the internal competition to fund our projects. Reducing costs and adding more value to our products is essential not only for budget approval, but also for our companies to compete.

SGML has proven to be invaluable for companies facing the information delivery challenge. SGML is the technology that many companies have employed to improve how they create and manage their information assets. For many more, SGML has opened new avenues for how that information can be delivered to their customers.

The benefits of using SGML can be quite extraordinary. SGML virtually unlocks the door to the advantages of reuse and automation - two areas where implementing new technology and processes let us attain the most significant cost improvements in our information production processes.

A solid cost justification proposal will help ensure the system gets off the drawing board and becomes reality.

Three Steps to Success

A cost justification proposal is more than just a series of line items with related costs. It is an important sales tool - one that will help ensure your success as you compete against others for funding.

Authors of successful cost justification proposals have three things in common. First, they have a clear understanding of their company's short- and long-term goals and objectives. Second, they have identified areas where new practices (or processes) and new technologies can contribute to reaching these goals. Third, they have adopted a production process vocabulary set to describe the changes and how these changes will benefit their customers.

Step 1. Understand Your Company's Goals

The type of product or service a company provides varies from company to company. Even within the same market, products and services vary as does the "volume" of product or service produced. What tends to be consistent from one company to another is how they define their marketing and sales goals. Your company is no exception. They are looking to either maintain their current market share, extend their market share, or expand into "new" markets.

Let's say your company has 30% of the XYZ market. Your company's goal may be to maintain that 30% market share even though, for example, a new competitor has entered the market. Or, your company could be looking to get more than a 30% market share. Having a larger percentage of the current market is extending the market share. The third option is to move into a new market with either an existing product or new product. This is what we mean by expanding into new markets.

Step 2. How You Contribute

You, along with other members of your work group or department, have an impact on whether or not your company reaches its goal. Your contribution increases when you come to understand the benefits and ramifications of shifting your focus from creating and delivering pages to creating and delivering information. Additionally, when you are able to identify tools and process changes that will result in improved production, reduced costs, more valuable or higher quality products, you position your company to meet future needs at less cost.

This last item is quite significant. Many companies were not in a position to deliver electronic publications when their customers first demanded them. To produce that first electronic publication was quite costly and took a great deal of time. Why? Because the tools and processes in place were geared to produce one type of output and one type of output only. You might say it was as challenging as trying to make a cherry pie when the only fruit you have are apples.

What is often put in place to support multiple outputs frequently results in the high maintenance overhead of supporting multiple sources of the information. This is neither optimal from a cost, quality, nor readiness standpoint.

What we do know is that we cannot predict how our information will be delivered in the future. To ensure a faster and less expensive way to meet these changing needs, many companies are moving toward creating a single source of re-usable information objects stored in a neutral (non proprietary) format.

Step 3. The Cost Justification Proposal

The cost justification proposal requires the use of a vocabulary set that most of us don't use on a day-to-day basis. Cost justification proposals are reviewed and approved by upper management and members of the financial staff. These people are generally more familiar with accounting, economics, and engineering processes, not SGML, DTDs, and document instances. Use terms they can relate to; develop your arguments so that even though the reader may not understand SGML itself, they can understand the benefits you expect to obtain. Identify both company and customer benefits, even those you cannot measure in hard dollars. And just as important is the need to describe improvements in efficiency and effectiveness.

Arguments in a cost justification proposal are generally developed by weighing pros and benefits against cons and costs of alternative approaches. Before we look at an example of how to do this, I'd like to return to SGML for just a moment.

Benefits of SGML Technology

There is considerable comfort is knowing that SGML is not a here today, gone tomorrow fad. It is a technology that results in significant benefits whether you are looking to support multiple delivery formats or are looking to re-engineer and modernize your information production processes.

First, SGML enables you to create a single base of reusable information objects. This results in improvements in accuracy and consistency.

If you are looking for ways to add more automation to your production process, then SGML is just what your computer ordered. SGML is a well-defined, predictable, reliable data format. It gives you the means to automate assembly and delivery as well as automate management processes such as reviewing, workflow, and revision control.

Third, it has become the easiest way to support new types of delivery media as they come on the market.

For those of you who have worked in a publications department for a few years or more, you have most likely experienced changing from one word processing system to another, or perhaps upgrading to a new version of your then-current word processing system. You have also experienced how much effort it took to get your data from the old system into the new system. Converting your data was required because you were moving from one proprietary format to another. SGML is "conversion insurance." Because SGML is an ISO standard, is both human and machine readable, and is supported by many software vendors, once your data is in SGML, you can change hardware and software suppliers or upgrade without having to convert your data. The data not only stays intact, it stays very usable.

SGML Supports Process Improvements

We've already spoken about how SGML allows you to automate the assembly and processing of your data - an important process improvement. But there are other process improvements that, depending on your particular situation or requirements, may have a higher importance for you. They are:

Increasing author productivity (because of the shift from presentation to content).

Reducing redundancy in authoring, translating, and storing data because the concept of "create once, check once, store once, and use many times" is reinforced.

Allowing more concurrent activities because a publication is "chunked" into smaller-sized information elements.

Adding versatility (which positions you better to respond to changes in customer and company needs and expectations).

How Does SGML Fit Your Company?

There are three basic reasons why companies move to SGML. One is because there is a contract requirement to either deliver or receive data in SGML. Another is because it's the easiest path to support delivery on paper, CD-ROM, the Web, etc. The third, which is where the greatest benefits are realized, is to support new processes and automate the whole spectrum of compound document management functions.

Research Your Alternatives

The arguments for using SGML are quite convincing. But, if you recall an earlier statement I made, the cost justification proposal requires a comparison of alternatives. The example I'd like to use is creating data specifically for HTML (a single form of electronic presentation and delivery) versus creating data to be delivered in a variety of output formats (various paper formats, various electronic formats, CD-ROM, etc.).

Just as a brief note, I'd like to point out that "electronic delivery" means something different to each person you talk to. It can mean HTML, PDF, the Intranet, a CD-ROM, a browser, or a Level 5 IETM. If you are going to use electronic delivery in your cost justification proposal, be sure you know what "electronic delivery" means to your company, customers, and target audience. Please also note that the comparative argument that follows could be used (just as easily) to compare creating data with a word processing system for paper delivery, as both (word processing systems and HTML) are primarily presentation/format oriented.

In our simplified comparative analysis, we'll look at goals, start-up costs, cost to produce a different type of output using the same source data, return on investment, and value to the customer. We'll start first by looking at creating data for an HTML delivery, then look at the case for creating data to support a multitude of output formats and requirements.

Types of Markup

Mark-up for HTML (or paper) is presentation or format focused. Content mark-up (i.e., SGML) is our preferred choice for supporting multiple delivery (and presentation) requirements.

Markup for Electronic Presentation In our example, our objective or goal for creating data in HTML is to support a single form of electronic delivery. The start-up costs are low because there are free or low-cost tools available for us to use, training is minimal (it's a small tag set), and there is a minimal change to author productivity (it's basically a case of how fast can you think and type). The return on investment is quite low for three main reasons. First, because HTML itself continues to change, your mark-up (and almost by default, the data) becomes obsolete very quickly. HTML 1 is different from HTML 2, etc. Because the mark-up becomes obsolete, you are actually creating legacy data. Most important in my mind is that you have very little ability to support reuse or recycling of information. Although your start-up costs may be low, the cost to produce an alternative output type is quite high because it requires conversion (which can cost anywhere from $1-$50 a page) or reauthoring. Both are quite high in terms of cost and from a quality, accuracy, and efficiency standpoint should be avoided. Because there is usually no easy way to get from HTML to a two-column fully formatted paper delivery, for example, what generally results is having to support multiple sources of the same information - one for each of the output types. Keeping these information sources in sync (because of last minute "tweaking" or the time it takes to get updates made to each source), is an expensive document maintenance issue. The value to the customer is moderate. HTML provides only limited ways to traverse the data, no support for unique data presentations (i.e., based on the reader skill or security level), and is limited to how much control (if any) you have on what amount or what combination of data appears on the screen at one time. If you have liability issues and concerns (i.e., the warning notice must appear on the screen at the same time as the step to which it applies), this can be extremely problematic and could make HTML useless as a delivery mechanism.
Markup for Content In comparing HTML to SGML, we state our goal for SGML as creating a single source of reusable information objects that can be combined to create a variety of publications and delivered in a variety of formats. Compared to an HTML start-up, the cost to start an SGML-based system can be high. The costs are associated with the need for an in-depth up-front document analysis, the new tools that need to be purchased, retraining (remember, we're requiring a change in thinking and adding new tools), and the cost of converting into SGML any existing data you wish to use. While the start-up costs are higher when we compare SGML to HTML, the return on investment is very high with SGML. Improvements in author productivity have been reported to be between 30% and 50% because of the shift from focusing on format to focusing on content. Redundant authoring is also eliminated which reduces unnecessary time and costs. One company reported that their average page took 8 hours to author, but only 5 minutes to search for and retrieve for reuse in the new system. Reuse or recycling of information can be quite significant. Another company reported that on the average 80% of any given publication was information that appeared in another publication. Because redundant authoring is minimized, author productivity is improved, and concurrent processing is supported, reductions in total production times of 20-75% have been reported. This can be quite significant if "time to market" is critical for your company or "readiness" is important to your customer. If the lifespan of your data is moderate to long, then the elimination of conversion costs as you change/upgrade hardware or software becomes a significant contributor to a high rate of return on your initial investment. With SGML data, the cost to produce alternative output types is low because it is supported by a large number of delivery tool providers and because it is easy to automate production. For example, your data would only need to be compiled to produce your CD- ROM product (a large European company reported that their CD-ROM production went from 2-4 weeks to 1-2 days). To produce HTML is an "on-the-fly" transformation process (HTML is a very small, flat DTD) and you can automatically apply formatting and "keep together" requirements for lights-out printing. One site was able to eliminate their need to review printed output page-by-page when they implemented an SGML-based publishing system. Because SGML mark-up is meta data (information about your information) in a neutral format, your data is optimized for future output needs. The value to your customers is extremely high. Because you can add an unlimited variety of information about your information to your information, SGML is supported by knowledge-based systems, such as those that can deliver information based on skill level, security level, and past searches. In addition, this meta data is what is used to keep information together under specified conditions which minimizes liability. A single source of reusable information objects results in more consistent, accurate data being available to your customers. And, it makes it easier for you to configure publications to meet your customers' unique requirements.

A Brief Comparison

To summarize:

	HTML	SGML
Goal	Single form of delivery	Single source of reusable information objects
Start-up costs	Low	High
Return on Investment	Low	High
Cost to produce alternative output	High	Low
Value to customer	Moderate	High

Cost Justification Challenges of SGML

There are certain challenges when building a cost justification proposal for SGML. The challenges come in determining the dollar value of benefits such as:

Competitive advantage

Improvements in quality

Use of a standard - reducing risks

Increased customer satisfaction

Positioning your company for long-term growth by establishing new revenue streams and being better prepared to respond to changing customer needs

The dollar value assigned to these benefits will vary by company and the ranked importance will differ from company to company as well.

Challenges When Implementing SGML

Challenges are also presented because there are intangible costs associated with SGML systems. For example, SGML requires a change in thinking (it's about information creation not page creation). Also, the changes are extremely visible. SGML isn't something you can "slip" on someone's computer and not expect them to notice. And, quite sadly, many individuals see SGML as providing benefits to the company, but not to themselves.

Being sensitive to these challenges and prepared to address them, most often results in a faster and smoother roll-out of the new tools.

Changing Authors' Responsibilities

In an SGML system, your authors focus on content. Users of SGML systems have reported significant savings in the time to author a new page compared to authoring the same page in a desktop system. Savings can be from 30-50%. How significant this measurement will be to you will be determined by the number of new pages you create each day or year and how much it costs to create each new page.

Many authors who have switched to SGML find significant personal satisfaction in their new roles as "information architects". Deciding at what level to modularize the data, incorporating markup so that service manuals and training instructions for the service procedures contained in the service manuals can be generated from the same information source, can be very rewarding. (Being able to receive an owner's manual specifically geared not just for your model, but for your individual car, would be exciting as well.)

Being able to easily "look-up" and reuse existing data rather than recreating it also has significant paybacks. At one of the sites I've worked with, they compare 5 minutes to search and retrieve information for reuse versus 8 hours to create a new page. In many companies, reauthoring is common place because existing information isn't easily retrievable or reusable. Keep in mind that each time you reauthor, you must also re- review and re-translate.

The Impacts of Reuse

It's not just the "authoring" process that is impacted by reuse. Reviewing, translating, and maintenance is impacted as well because they are processes that sit downstream from the authoring process.

To determine how much "reuse" is worth to you, you need to first know how much of the information in your publications is "new" versus "recycled". In many companies, "recycled" or "existing" information constitutes a large portion of a publication. Whether the amount of recycled information in your publication is 15% or 80%, the more information you reuse rather than recreate, the more efficiencies you gain.

And, if by changing how you create the information from a "document" approach to a "document object" approach - so that a document is a container of "objects", you could possibly increase the amount of information that can be reused by several percentage points. Again, the more reuse you can build into the system, the more cost improvements you can attain.

Cost Justification Methods

Return on Investment (ROI) is a widely used method for analyzing performance and measuring profitability. In ROI, a dollar value must be stated for all benefits and costs. In other words, everything must be quantified.

If we think back on the SGML benefits we've covered earlier, we realize that some of the benefit arguments are difficult to quantify. For example, how do we put a value on competitive advantage, or improvements in quality, or the use of standards, or increases in customer satisfaction? These are important benefits, but estimating a dollar value for them can be a formidable task.

Because a cost justification proposal that relies solely on ROI may result in the omission of important benefits from the decision-making process, you may find a Cost-Benefit Analysis more successful.

A Cost-Benefit Analysis (CBA) differs from an ROI in that the pros or benefits of one solution are compared against the cons or costs of another. Because arguments for benefits that cannot be easily estimated in dollar terms are included, management is able to take into consideration both the quantifiable and nonquantifiable factors when making its decision. The focus in a CBA is on effectiveness and efficiency for optimal allocation of resources.

The HTML/SGML comparative analysis given earlier was based on a CBA approach. While the intent of this paper is not to take you too deeply into formulas, I would like to illustrate how you can use some fairly simple equations to associate cost savings to some of the more tangible SGML benefits.

Three simple examples are given below. I'd be happy to share more ideas with you.

Please feel free to contact me at my office in Ann Arbor at +1 313.997.0200.

Example: Value of Conversion Insurance

Many first-time writers of cost justification proposals have found the following example helpful in formulating their own cost figures.

Example One: Determining the Value of Conversion Insurance

Note 1: Conversion costs vary between $1-$50 per page depending on the type of data, volume, and consistency. Enter the cost per page for your data into the formulas below to get the cost savings for your publications.

Note 2: Companies generally change hardware platforms on the average of every 5 years and software packages every 3 years. Over the life of your data, how many times would you expect to upgrade hardware and software?

Conversion $$ over the life of the data if the data is marked-up for presentation = #pages x cost/page x # times converted.

Conversion $$ over the life of SGML data = # pages x cost/page x 1.

Cost savings = Conversion $$ for presentation - Conversion $$ for SGML.

Example: Content Authoring, Time-to-Market

Example Two: Impact of content authoring focus on time-to-market.

Note 1: Using a desktop publishing system, authors at one company averaged 4.3 hours/page of new text. With an SGML system, these same authors averaged 2.7 hours page.

Time to complete project = hours/page x 3 pages.

Example: Content Authoring, $ Savings

Example Three: Impact of content authoring focus on wage expense.

Presentation

hourly wage x hours to complete = $$

Content

hourly wage x hours to complete = $$

Savings in wage expense = Presentation $$ - Content $$.

Please contact the author for additional formulas that can be used.

Use SGML to your Benefit

There are many good reasons why SGML has become an integral part of many companies' information production system. SGML keeps your information assets liquid.

Your cost justification proposal is your key to success.


The Evolution of Sun's AnswerBooks		Table of contents		Indexes		SGML in Transition