[Sigia-l] IA Testing and What is an IA (was Usability Testing comments from Giga)

[Lyle_Kantrovich at cargill.com]

Marios:
> Again, as with my original post.. so what kind of testing do IA folk 
do? If
> you are an IA and work in the field how do you assure your clients 
that what
> you propose to release will work?

I'm not an Information Architect!  I think I'm "IA folk" and I do 
various kinds of testing.  But pardon me while I expand on what I think 
it means to *be* an IA...

Sometimes I play "information architect" at work.  Some people even 
call me an IA...it doesn't mean I AM one.

I know and do lots of things:
- I design and create information architectures
- I know about taxonomies, metadata, controlled vocabularies and 
metadata
- I know various methods for creating navigation and labeling systems
- I know quite a bit about the complexities of search and information 
retrieval
- I know a little about some content management systems.
- I've designed content management processes
- I design user interfaces - mainly web, handheld and GUI 
computer-based UIs.
- I know my way around PhotoShop fairly well, and have been 
complemented on graphic designs I've done.
- I do lots of business analysis - gathering requirements, documenting 
workflow, etc.
- I often lead small projects, and I've lead a few big ones in the past.
- I've developed many web sites in the last 8 years and speak fluent 
HTML, JavaScript and lots of other acronyms.
- I know some things about Branding and Marketing, and much of my work 
involves those things
- There are lots of things I don't know about IA, CMS, Search, 
Interaction Design, Project Management, Business Analysis, Marketing, 
Branding and Graphic Design

- I know enough to know some of what I don't know about these things. 
- I know some people I can call if I need deeper expertise in certain 
areas.  I know lots of people *I* would call "IAs."


So what label do I wear?  Personally, I don't really care much about 
that.  Right now, my business card reads "User Experience Architect" - 
hopefully it gives people an inkling about what my focus is.  In the 
past it's said things like "Sr. Business Analyst" and "Project Manager" 
and "Consultant."  I find that my current title makes people ask 
questions about what I do which provides me an opportunity to tell them 
how I can add value to their business.  That's good enough for me.

- I feel comfortable with "IA folks" - I talk their language, and do 
work similar to what many "IAs" I know do.  I'm ticked that I didn't 
get to go to the IA Summit this year.
- I feel comfortable with "Usability folks", I'm a member of SIGCHI and 
UPA and on the board of my local UPA chapter.  I am going to the UPA 
conference this year.
- I can hang with IT developers and often do.  I even often give them 
technical assistance.  

Labels are rarely descriptive or accurate enough (most IAs know this).  
I play lots of _roles_ for my customers, and my customers really don't 
care about my title.  They care about what I do and how I add value.  
Just one of the roles I play is the role of IA.  

A student from a local university recently interviewed me - because I 
"was an IA."  He wanted to know about IA, what it is, where it's going, 
and what he should focus on if he wanted to be an IA.  My advice was 
that he learn about what different IAs do, determine his areas of 
interest, and focus on those areas.  I recommended he become a 
generalist as that's where most of the jobs are going to be.  (Don't go 
focus just on search retrieval and metadata - you're likely to 
pigeonhole yourself.)

Why do we talk about "what is IA" or "what is an Information Architect" 
so much?

Let talk about what each of us does.  Rather than outline boundaries, 
let's focus on areas of common interest.  And let's learn about related 
areas too like branding, technology, consulting, communication, project 
management, selling, documentation, etc., etc., etc.

To Marios' question:  
I do lots of usability testing.
I do cognitive walkthroughs
I do heuristic evaluations
I do card sorts (open and closed)
Each of these can be used to assess a UI's (or an information system's, 
or a structure's) effectiveness.  Some methods are more "test-like" 
than others.  There are other ways to get feedback on a product's 
effectiveness: sales, system usage, customer feedback, help-desk call 
volumes, surveys, interviews, etc.  

I tend to do more formative testing as opposed to summative testing.  
(See http://www.utep.edu/~cetal/portfoli/form-sum.htm for definitions.) 
 I find these kinds of tests very valuable for my clients.  

If other IAs don't do these kinds of 'tests', then how do they know 
they're on target with their deliverables?  Purely based on client 
feedback?  If that's the case, I don't personally find that a very 
mature approach.  Over time, you have to be able to prove your worth, 
and nice comments and testimonials don't go very far.


Lyle

----
Lyle Kantrovich
User Experience Architect
Cargill 
http://www.cargill.com 

Croc O' Lyle: personal commentary on usability, Information 
Architecture, and web design
http://crocolyle.blogspot.com