Empirical analysis of the evolution of a taxonomy for best practices

Taxonomies play an increasingly role in knowledge management, providing the basis on which to find and communicate knowledge, information and metrics. However, knowledge continues to evolve over time. As a result, taxonomies also need to continue to evolve. Two different evolved versions of a taxonomy for best practices, each based on the same original taxonomy were analyzed. This research investigated empirical approaches to trace the changes in the original taxonomy. In so doing, an approach using empirical findings to monitoring and anticipating taxonomy change is initiated. There were a number of findings, including a tendency to evolve to greater complexity. © 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.