[Sigia-l] is it just me, or is it really hard to find IAs

[Linda Kolar]

Donna Maurer wrote:

> Is the longer term work interesting enough to attract people to stay
with
> the company.

Ziya wrote:

> At the risk of sounding politically incorrect, for a seasoned pro,
there
> would be extremely few companies that would qualify here.

I think once again this is the difference between full-time employment
at a company versus full-time employment at an agency. As a UEA at an
interactive marketing agency, I am currently working on (among other
things) a massive, B2B portal implementation (in which I was involved
from requirements through func design, wireframing and usability
testing) and a small, promotional/viral marketing site to increase usage
of text messaging. 

We tend to have retainer-based relationships with our main clients, but
other smaller projects come through all the time, which means I'm always
exploring new subject matter and extending my knowledge. In other words,
I find the environment perfect for keeping me challenged while also
providing stability of employment. :)

Within our model, we've actually found it very hard to employ freelance
IAs. Our methodology integrates strategy, architecture, design and
content fairly extensively, and we typically are serving as the
translators between our business/marketing clients and their IT
departments. As a result, it's very difficult for us to 'drop' an IA
into a project with a discrete deliverable or two, especially if they
aren't working onsite (in our office) with the rest of the team. 

We've done some short-term contracts for fairly straightforward,
stand-alone items like heuristics or competitive analyses, but for major
projects with our long-term clients, we also encounter the "lost
knowledge" problem, but from the other side. Without having the IA
in-house, hearing and seeing everything that is going on, we waste too
much time trying to relay our institutional knowledge about the client's
situation and needs and/or reworking solutions that were created by a
freelancer who was "out of the loop."

Linda M. Kolar, DVM MPH
THINK
Integrated Marketing and Technology
Atlanta, GA 30309