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Am I An Information Architect? (Part 1 of a Presentation in Progress)

Written by Russ on February 21, 2008 – 12:47 am

Am I an Information Architect?

It seems I’ve been asking myself that question a lot lately. Fortunately, there’s never a shortage for a discussion thread on the IAI list that lights a fire under everyone from Peter Boersma to Andrew Hinton and all the way back again. This week has been no different–and the stars could not have been better aligned.

I’ve been endeavoring to put together a clear, easy-to-consume presentation explaining not only “what I do” as an Information Architect for the company that I work for, but an overview of what Information Architecture is. I’d like to also cover when IA should be engaged and how we can be doing it better.

Pretty bold, eh? It’s certainly a lot easier to talk about doing something like this than it is to sit down and actually put it together.

I want to provide the business with an accurate depiction of what Russ, The Information Architecture Department actually does for them. Is it just more than site maps and wireframes and the random persona? The more I work through the process of putting together a cohesive explanation and presentation, the more that I realize that I’m more than an Information Architect. I’m instrumental to the success of the (Software) Development Life Cycle.

I realize that part of this exercise could be seen as self-serving–it is. I have professional and personal goals to attain, and I also want/need to ensure that any company that I work for is best prepared utilize my skills. This will not only attribute to my own satisfaction, but it will also provide the company with a clear understanding as to when it would be best to engage me.

The best way that I could see to achieve this was to find the right information amassed over the years of working in the field and couple it with plenty of input from some wise folks in the Information Architecture community who have already done this–or at least have some pretty serious opinions about it. I started out by identifying the topics that I felt would make a good foundation for the presentation. I even had a working title:

Why Information Architecture is [More] Important to This Company [Than You Think / Are Aware]

What is Information Architecture?
How important Information Architecture is to the organization?
How important Information Architecture to the industry? (advertising, for what it’s worth, and very!)
What types of roles / resources are needed?
Who Information Architecture interfaces / works with / influences?
What are Information Architecture deliverables?
When should Information Architecture be engaged?
What is an Information Architect’s job description?
What is an appropriate career path for an Information Architect?

Awesome, right? If nothing else, it was a start. Information Architect, they middle name is Iteration.

As with all things planned, once you start down the journey you realize that you might have brought along the wrong map. Peter Boersma was one of the “so-much-smarter-than-me” folks who was kind enough to provide some input and some of his previous presentation materials. One of the first things I found in an older presentation by Peter was a definition of User-Centered Design. Peter uses the definition of User-Centered Design from Microsoft and it was the first of a few key things that began to shift the direction of my presentation. When you couple that definition with Peter Morville’s 3 Circles of Information Architecture (slightly adjusted for the audience), the picture becomes a little more clear:

“User experience and interface design in the context of creating software (applications, websites, etc.) represents an approach that puts the user, rather than the system, at the center of the process.
This philosophy, called User-Centered Design, incorporates user concerns and advocacy from the beginning of the design process and dictates the needs of the user should be foremost in any design decisions*.”

I added the * to further explain that:

Executional Mandatories and Business Goals have priority and should be appropriately considered and/or negotiated to drive the best possible user experience.

Like it or not, sometimes you have to be able to work with a business requirement that you don’t like. You need to be able to make the best out of a less than perfect situation.

Then, through the wealth of information that is Semantic Studios and Peter Morville, I also “borrowed” the User Experience Honeycomb (and supporting, easy to understand definitions).

Morville has one of the easiest to understand approaches to UX, so rather than recreating the wheel as “Russ’s Stop Signs of UX”, I slightly modified his for my own use:

After I had created these first 2 slides with the help of Peter and Peter, I started to feel as if Information Architecture might not be the focus of my presentation. I was trying to figure out what was happening to make that shift– I was not sure if the definition that my organization uses for Information Architecture was inaccurate or if I was trying too hard to make Information Architect my official title (that never shows up on a business card).

I returned to the well. Peter Boersma identified a T-model that started out showing how IA and “Related Fields” would intersect, sharing some shallow and deep connecting points, but having some areas that never connected at all. Peter’s explanation is a lot easier to read than it is for me to paraphrase, so let me cut to the chase: Peter eventually morphed his T-model to show in the overlapping areas exactly where the User Experience practioners operate. He displays the various functional areas–such as Information Architecture, Visual Design, Usability, Interaction Design, etc. and shows how they all intersect with UX Design:

That’s a nice T-model, and that T-model opened my eyes to something slightly different than what Peter showed. I started to visualize the Software/Project Development Life Cycle and how it’s connected into User Experience Design:

Pretty cool, right? Your process may vary (YPMV), but it should be pretty easy to plug in. Almost everyone on a project is–or should be–a part of the User Experience Design, right?

Right. Even Peter admits that he is ready to give up the title of Big IA in favor (well, he says favour) of User Experience practitioner.

I agree, Peter. I agree!

And this is going to cost me some more umbrella drinks at the IA Summit in Miami in April. [sigh]

Then I saw a path to something beyond the Life Cycle. I started to see a measurement of my level, or depth of expertise:

That there is pretty darn cool. I think so, at least.

I fell in love with this idea pretty quickly and saw how this could be of great assistance even further down the road. While it could be somewhat subjective (as all assessments generally are), it could also be the foundation for a tool to measure and identify the UX maturity and career path of employees. Sure, it needs to be flushed out more, but the core appears to be sound.

What does all of this tell me? What have I learned at this point?

I’ve learned that, while I very much perform A LOT of Information Architecture tasks, I also perform a lot of tasks that are bucketed for different phases of the Project Life Cycle.

Does that make me a generalist?

Possibly, but I don’t think so. I feel more like a specialist who has had the (good?) fortune to have exposure and experience across a variety of functions. These various strengths support me in defining the role that I am looking for under the umbrella of User Experience Design.

Right now, the presentation “feels” as if it is about halfway complete. I think I need to update my original outline. Here is iteration #2:

What is User Experience Design and How It Fits in This Company