Playbook Consolidation &
Single-Source Publishing

In 2019, ahead of a major federal cybersecurity audit scheduled for early 2020, I was tasked with reviewing and updating process documentation—known as playbooks—for eight interrelated cybersecurity teams. As the Knowledge Manager, I quickly discovered that while each team had some unique processes, much of the content—particularly front and back matter, regulatory overviews, and standard processes—was duplicated across teams. Recognizing the inefficiency and risk of inconsistencies, I proposed transitioning from Word-based documents to a single-source publishing model using MadCap Flare. This allowed us to consolidate shared content into reusable topics and tailor team-specific language using variables and conditional formatting, enabling fast, accurate output across all deliverables.