[Sigia-l] AIfIA Goals 2004 Survey Results

[Listera]

"david_fiorito at vanguard.com" wrote:

> Standards become important when the company is larger and projects can
> span years multiple IAs.  Standards allow your work to endure, to be
> easily adapted, and to be easily translated.

Nonsense.

"According to the Standish Group, more than $275 billion will be spent on
software development this year, covering about 250,000 projects. That means
that if the recent success and failure percentages apply [roughly a quarter
will fail outright], $63 billion in development costs will go down the
toilet in 2003 alone." And that's *not* because the bureaucracies of the
corporate world were not neck deep in "standards."

"Standards" are often a substitute for the ability to think thorough
problems. They may be as detrimental as they are helpful. The world has
"standardized" on an operating system, for example, that's for all practical
purposes impossible to secure. Are we all better for using it?

> I understand the impulse towards the "art" and away from the "science".

What "science"? Tagging an "engineer" after your title or wearing white lab
coats during cart sorting doesn't amount to "science."

> We have found that standards for design, deliverables, process, and the like
> are critical to long-term success.

And what would those "standards" be? Navbar on the left, links in blue,
Visio for charts?
 
> If all of the employers out there see that there are strong
> standards and definitions around this thing called Information
> Architecture then it will be easier to evaluate candidates and fill
> positions.  

Finally the last refuge: here come the licensors!

CIA, the Certificate of Information Architecture. The test: $899. The book:
$139. The prep course: $699. Instant certification industry. Next: machine
readable IA evaluation software: $129.95. No brain cells were harmed during
the hiring process of this 'standardized' candidate!

> I can't tell you the number of times I have seen a resume of
> someone claiming the title of information architect yet none of there
> skills or experience even comes close to the most lax definition of the
> trade.

So don't hire them. You can think for yourself, can't you? You'd feel
utterly secure if he had a CIA? Sanctioned software: check. Sanctioned
books: check. Knows the buzzwords: check. Dues paid: check. Certificate:
check. Hire'em.
 
> "Standards" does not equate to "rigidity".  The PMA (Project Management
> Association) has strict standards.  Yet when they work on projects PMA
> trained project managers use those standards like an artist in their
> favorite medium.

This is getting to be as hilarious as the Hertz commercial: "not exactly."
Artists don't get "standardized." If PMs aspire to act like artists
("project managers use those standards like an artist in their favorite
medium") then they won't need standardization either. If half of the
"standardized," certificate-toting IT drones could be half as rigorous as
the artists I know, we wouldn't be in the sorry shape we're in.
 
> We IAs are a lot that seems to always balk at being limited or put in a
> box, 

Yeah we all should strive to get bureaucratized into a box, that's the
ticket!

> but I think the only way we will ever be taken as seriously as others
> in the professional ranks is to create standards and definitions for who
> we are, what we do, and how we do it.

Sanctioned software: check. Sanctioned books: check. Knows the buzzwords:
check. Dues paid: check. Certificate: check. Hire'em.

I don't think you're going far enough: let's really commoditize IA so we can
outsource it offshore and be done with it.

----
Ziya

Is what you say more important than how you say it?