[Sigia-l] Gray is a shade of black

[Patrick Hunt]

I cherish the fact that on this list you can have a spirited debate about
important issues to this community, and I have no trouble with someone
disagreeing with me (Paula's characterization of my opinion as horse shit
notwithstanding).

I actually agree with much of what Paula says, and I stand by my original
assertion. The question I was addressing was where IA should live in an
organization, not how a site should be structured.

My point, perhaps not so eloquently stated as others who have since
expressed the same opinion, is that "it depends" where IA should live in the
organization. And my questions are absolutely relevant, if perhaps phrased
too broadly, though I think appropriate for a discussion on theory, not
practice. 

The questions were written from the perspective of an information architect.
Here are some examples of how I would begin to answer these questions for
very different organizations:

Amazon.com's purpose is to sell products to customers. Thus, perhaps IA best
lives in marketing.

WashingtonPost.com's purpose is to inform the public. Therefore, IA may be
best positioned in editorial.

GE.com's purpose appears to be to serve as a portal to their various
companies, so perhaps this is an example where IA is best suited for
corporate communications.

(NOTE: "perhaps" and "may." I can't pretend to know enough about these
companies to suggest that these are the right answers for them.)

Did I intend for the list of questions to be exact or exhaustive? Absolutely
not. Do I honestly believe that these specific questions will lead to the
answers of how a site should be defined? No. But is it worthwhile to
consider these and other deeper and more meaningful questions to determine
how to manage the organization, where the information architecture
discipline could best serve the organization so that it could add value by
understanding stakeholders' perceptions of value.

The issue of where IA should live is not a black and white one. There is no
easy, stock answer to the question of where IA should live. There is too
much gray matter. Organizations and their people (what is an organization if
not the people, ie stakeholders, that comprise it?) are far too different to
have a cookie cutter answer to this question.

Patrick
silly purveyor of crap, crap and more crap
;-)

PS--On another topic, from the organization's perspective, someone *does*
own the telephone. Someone was tasked with defining requirements for
features, scalability, interoperability, expandability, etc. Someone did a
market and competitive analysis, tests and interviews with users. Someone
did a cost comparison. Someone made a recommendation. And based on their
boss's decision, someone had to implement and now must maintain the system.
Someone does own the telephone, even though many people use it and their
opinions are critical in making the right decisions. Information may want to
be free, the Internet may in part be the wild wild web out there, power to
the people, but in an organization, someone absolutely must own the website.
Design by committee is costly, time consuming and disastrous.

> From: "Paula Thornton" <paula.thornton at prodigy.net>
> Date: Wed, 22 May 2002 11:51:17 -0700
> To: "ASIS" <sigia-l at asis.org>
> Subject: [Sigia-l] Gray is a shade of black
> 
> With all due respect to Patrick (read: don't take this personally), I needed
> some fodder for building a soapbox. Patrick obliged:
> 
> What is the organization's purpose?
> Who are its customers?
> What is the website strategy?
> Who are the site's users?
> 
> Crap, crap and more crap. Look at those questions. Whose perspective are
> they from? What defines the purpose of an organization? Find an organization
> that not only knows its purpose but can readily define its differentiators
> in the marketplace and I'll publicly praise their efforts.
> 
> Those questions remind me of the same 'silliness' (though certainly solid
> 'basics' for lack of anything else) as individuals (I used to be one of
> them) who look at a site that they've had no involvement in and 'evaluate'
> it. Granted, it is warranted to point out specific 'usability' flaws.
> However (note the megaphone being raised higher), the principles of
> usability do absolutely nothing for measuring the 'reasonableness' of a
> site. It may work perfectly...so what? Did that 'perfect experience' help me
> accomplish something of value? How much value did I assign to it, such that
> with a little more 'trouble' I might have gained even more value?
> 
> Back to the first point. ALL, (emphasis with repetition) all business
> activity (read: organization's purpose) should only be couched in the
> strengths and potential it has to deliver specific value to its
> stakeholders. Just like there is really no such thing as a CIO...they
> deliver 'data' not 'information' because whether or not something informs is
> determined by its recipient, the 'value' a business delivers is defined by
> the recipients (stakeholders).
> 
> The list of questions that Patrick listed needs to be put away and
> forgotten. They need to be replaced with questions that assess the strengths
> that a business has to deliver things that are valued by its stakeholders.
> These things cannot be assessed until we better involve, learn to truly know
> and continuously re-test the intents of stakeholders.
> 
> Paula
> 
> Content Management Symposium, Chicago O'Hare Marriott, June 28 - 30.
> See http://www.asis.org/CM
> 
> ASIST SIG IA: http://www.asis.org/SIG/SIGIA/index.html
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