A knowledge management research study was integrated into a consulting internship for three students in an MLIS programme, working under the direction of a faculty member. The project scope was to organise knowledge across all academic disciplines, as represented in university structures, in support of the consulting client’s software analytics tools for scholarly journal publishers. The study team’s original research contribution was a four-phase design and validation approach to taxonomy creation, using extant research methods in concert. The students learned to bridge their coursework knowledge into a knowledge management environment in industry and to apply data collection and analysis methods to a novel research project.