Pat’s Point of View

I recently blogged about facilitating a discussion session on the topic of “Documenting for Interactive Websites” as part of Ark Group’s two day conference on Enhancing Online User Experiences. The event was held last Friday (it took me a week to blog it?!) and it went very well. In order to document the session and allow further discussion I have blogged my thoughts over on the USiT blog. Feel free to leave feedback or continue the conversation.

The conference was quite enlightening, with a good mix of presentations on a variety of subjects. I was only able to attend the second day, but what I saw was good food for thought.

I particularly liked Rod Farmer‘s presentation on managing a UX team. Very interesting stuff on choosing your team members, including looking beyond technical skills to personality types (please post your slides on SlideShare Rod!slides are now on Slideshare).

Jodie Moule had some great case studies of the use of personas for Telstra projects. Check out her slideshow.

James Breeze‘s discussion on using social media for user research was also great. Wish I had had a wifi connection so I could have participated in his Twitter demo :)

In November I’ll be appearing at the Ark Group conference Enhancing Online User Experience in Melbourne. My contribution will be an interactive discussion on “Documenting for interactive websites”.

Since it’s an interactive discussion, the most crucial part of the session will be input from the audience and the discussion that emerges. To that end I’ve launched a special forum to allow conference attendees (or anyone for that matter) to suggest the topics they would like discussed:

(If you can’t see the widget above, you can go to patrickkennedy.uservoice.com)

You can suggest a question, or vote for an existing question. I’ll try to cover as many as I can in the time available during the session.

I see two broad aspects to ‘documenting for interactive wesbites’, the first being design documentation and the second being project documentation. By design documentation I mean the sketches, wireframes, storyboards, flow charts or whatever other form of documentation that is used to document what is it that being developed. And by project documentation I mean those documents such as SOWs and project plans that assist with project management and logistics.

I’ll attempt to cover both aspects but ultimately the session will be run by audience participation, so get voting on the topics you want discussed!

The conference details are:

Enhancing Online User Experience

Developing and executing user experience strategies that will provide business benefits

• Date: 12 – 14 Nov 2008
• Location: Melbourne, Australia

More details on their website

My interactive discussion is on the last day, just after lunch.

I’m pleased to announce I’ll be running another pre-conference workshop, this time it’s Demystifying Information Architecture at OZCHI 2008 in sunny Cairns on the afternoon of December 9th.

There has been much confusion and misinformation regarding information architecture (IA) and its relationship with the longer established areas of user-centred design (UCD). Many experienced HCI people don’t feel well-equipped to take on the practical side of UCD in relation to web design. Likewise, web designers and developers are often in the dark regarding the principles behind what some “usability guy” tells them to do.

In this half-day tutorial, Patrick Kennedy will present the fundamentals of IA, which in essence is focussed on ensuring that information systems are structured in a way that makes sense to users. Specifically, the tutorial will be conducted in the context of organising and designing information systems such as websites, intranets and software applications.

This tutorial will introduce IA, explain the fundamental principles and teach some simple techniques. The aim is to give participants a heads-up on the subject and point them in the right direction so they can integrate IA into their own work or just better collaborate with those already practicing IA.

It will be short, sharp and focussed on just the essential bits of IA. So if you’re up that way in December, check it out.

The conference itself starts a few days later on the 10th of December. OZCHI is Australia’s leading forum for work in all areas of Human-Computer Interaction and CHISIG’s (www.chisig.org) annual non-profit conference. OZCHI attracts an international community of practitioners, researchers, academics and students from a wide range of disciplines including user experience designers, information architects, software engineers, human factors experts, information systems analysts, social scientists and managers. While OZCHI’08 represents aspects of the Australian Interaction Design community that have not been emphasized in recent conferences our organizing team is committed to serving the range of interests.

They say you learn more from your mistakes than you do from your successes. Amen to that. They also say that you should be man (or woman) enough to admit your mistakes. So here I am, bearing my soul to the internet, saying I screwed up and have learnt valuable lessons.

Yesterday I ran my Research Methods for IA workshop for OZ-IA, and whilst I was actually quite happy with the content, the timing was off big-time. Luckily my gracious guests for the afternoon agreed with this summary, the feedback forms were overwhelmingly positive for the content, materials and myself…but the time allocated was totally inadequate. You see, I tried to cram a whole day into half a day.

Why did I do such an idiotic thing? Why did I break one of the fundamental rules of workshops (and lots of other things) and not keep it simple? Well there are lots of excuses I could give, like when I first planned the workshop it was for a full day, or that I’m so used to doing full-day workshops that my ‘internal rhythm’ was set to that, or that this is my first workshop I’ve designed entirely on my own from the ground up, or that I’ve been burning the candle from both ends lately and didn’t give this as much thought as it deserved. But they’re not the real reasons.

The real reason is that I try to pack too much in because I want to tell people everything. I was trying to be everything to everyone. And that’s not achievable.

Moving forward I know I need to do this workshop over a whole day. Given more time it would have gone brilliantly, and I need to make sure I do it that way from now on. But the reverse is also true, if I only have half a day then I need to tailor the content to half a day. I shall be ruthless for my next workshop, which is on a different topic, paring it right down and allowing plenty of time for activities and Q&A.

Another lesson I’ve learnt through doing this workshop is how much harder it is to do all this on your own. My previous workshops with Step Two were much easier, in that the groundwork had already been done and there were more hands to make light work of tasks such as printing, creating card sorting cards, shipping materials to the venue etc.

And I also learnt that I should take help from those around me, even if it means putting aside time when in the thick of it, to stop and talk it through and get advice. Particularly my long-suffering wife, who is an organisational master. I, being hopeless at organising things, should have consulted her when preparing for the workshop.

For my first time out of the gates on this particular horse, it could have gone better. Whilst this jockey didn’t exactly fall right off his mount, he did get dragged along a bit. But you know what they say, you need to get back in the saddle, and I’m certain that if I keep refining this workshop it will serve me well.

And I truly hope, so because I really like running workshops. I get to help others by passing on my knowledge and experience; it causes lovely warm fuzzy feelings.

I’m happy to announce I’ll be running a half-day workshop entitled Research methods for information architecture at this year’s OZ-IA conference (actually the workshop is on Thursday the 18th of September).

This is an important part of successful IA, and I intend to give practical insight into some key techniques that will allow IA practitioners, or other disciplines doing some IA, to gain valuable insight into their audience. Here’s my blurb:

Information architecture (IA) is a form of user-centred design (UCD) which requires an understanding of users and their needs and designing with those needs in mind – balanced by factors such as business objectives and available or necessary content. Without a solid understanding of these inputs into the process, design is blind.

Design research is the process of uncovering and understanding those needs, whether it be direct user research or other means of gathering requirements.

Yet, many experienced web designers, developers and IA practitioners don’t feel well-equipped to take on design research in their projects.

In this half-day workshop, Patrick Kennedy will present the fundamentals of design research from the perspective of IA. Specifically, the workshop will be conducted in the context of organising and designing information systems such as websites, intranets and software applications.

This workshop will introduce design research, explain the fundamental principles and teach some simple techniques. The aim is to give the audience a heads-up on the subject and point them in the right direction so they can integrate research into their own work or just better collaborate with design researchers.

You can register for the conference at www.oz-ia.org/2008/register.shtml and don’t forget to quote the discount code PK0265!

This afternoon I presented my session at WebDU on the topic of information architecture for designers and developers. In the particular case of WebDU, these designers and developers mostly specialise in Flex and Flash.

I’m fairly happy with how it came together in the end, hopefully I gave the audience some insight into the field of IA, and user experience in general. Apologies for the messy looking slides on SlideShare, when it was converted from Powerpoint all the embedded fonts had to be replaced with Arial!

Other than my contribution, there was of course a whole conference, and a great conference it was. My initial impressions were that it’s a great location (level 2 of the Darling Harbour Conference centre) which is nicely laid out and spacious. The over all feel is pretty slick, and they gave out some excellent swag, I know it’s quite trivial but a great t-shirt, conference bag (with good stuff inside including a selection of relevant magazines from sponsors) put the finishing touch on an event such as this. Much better than the wads of marketing crap you usually get.

The conference proceedings book is a good idea, with the slides (or at least initial summary slides in my case) from each session, and information on speakers and the conference in general. Sadly there was no agenda for quick reference to the sessions, when and where. There was an A4 sheet with this info on it, but not in the bags or proceedings book. I still think having this in the back of the name tag lanyard is the best approach.

A rather novel thing they did was have trading cards with the avatars for each conference organiser. At first I thought they might have had a card for each presenter too, which sent me into a mini panic at the thought of people trading my face around the place thinking who the heck is this guy? :) It’s a good networking idea and builds a sense of fun around the event, after all it’s not some stuffy academic conference, these are people who make cool websites and apps, it should be fun.

And of course there was the crucial, especially for this audience, free wifi. I used to roll my eyes upon hearing geeks whinging “aww man, no wireless!” but I must admit I now expect it of any conference or seminar. I hate people typing and surfing during sessions, but in between or if you need to get a bit of work done during the course of the day (like I did) then having internet access is crucial.

(At first my laptop didn’t see the free network, and this made me think that it could be a neat little business opportunity for buildings within range of conference centres that don’t offer free wifi, setup a Meraki mesh for a cheap rate…or free)

While there were some interesting topics being presented on the first day, and I was pleased to see the current state of the art in terms of RIA and interactive interface development, I had to take a bit of time out to put some finishing touches on my presentation.

So there are certainly some cool things being wheeled out of Adobe and the like, with the possibility for highly advanced and integrated web apps and desktop apps. Adobe’s AIR in particular is looking pretty good. But of course, as a user experience person, I can see there being many opportunities for all this technology to become a usability nightmare. The ball is definitely in our court, though, so far as we need to work out how we can be part of this new generation and create consistent and useful experiences across browser, desktop, device and all the different usage scenarios that that entails.

I’m quite looking forward to taking part in this year’s WebDU conference in June. I’ll be presenting Demystifying Information Architecture which will be aimed at web designers and developers who have more than likely heard of this IA thing, but perhaps aren’t entirely sure what it is or how to go about doing it properly.

In some ways I’ll be continuing my efforts to engage with developers, a process I first started with my WSG presentation Intranets–why you should care. That was fairly well received but this time I will have to combat the stigma of ‘those bloody usability people’ instead of the intranet stigma.

If you’re a web designer, developer or producer/manager, what is it you’d like to know about IA and usability? How could I demystify it for you?

If the website and my initial contact with the organisers are anything to go by, then it should be a pretty fun two days. And I’m pretty chuffed with my animated avatar!

I am now live on the air…on the net. The latest edition of Gerry Gaffney’s UXpod, user experience podcast, features yours truly speaking on the subject of mentoring. It follows my presentation at last year’s OZCHI and OZ-IA on the same topic, based on my experiences mentoring a group of non IAs through the UCD process to create a new IA for their large website.

I hate to uphold a cliche, but I’m not much of a fan of hearing my own voice. Although listening back to recordings of user interviews, focus groups, workshops and usability testing sessions has meant I am much more used to it than I used to be.

But that said, podcasting is such a great medium for this kind of content, and I was very happy to participate. Hopefully this edition will be as useful for listeners as the previous editions have been. I know I have found it quite useful to hear a concise discussion on a UX related topic, from an expert (although I’d hardly call myself an expert on mentoring). They’re great for when you’re on the bus.

Oh and here’s a tip for you, podcasts of your own voice are great for putting baby to sleep :)

My dance card has been filled for the first half of this year, with two iterations of my newly updated Information Architecture Essentials workshop series. The dates and locations are:

• 9 April 2008 – Mercure Hotel, Sydney
• 18 June 2008 – Rydges South Bank, Brisbane

Here’s the blurb:

In this one-day workshop, Patrick Kennedy will present the fundamentals of information architecture (IA), the core methodology for organising and designing websites and intranets.

Key skills such as card sorting will be taught, and this workshop is designed to build in-house information architecture skills. A must for all web or intranet teams.

Since the last public workshop, I was invited to run essentially the same workshop for IBM Global Services at their annual 'Summer School' in Melbourne. This was a fantastic event to be a part of, even if the Melbourne weather in January was intolerably hot! I’ve made a few improvements to the workshop since then.

Whilst the workshop has been refreshed, it still aims to introduce the fundamentals of IA and user-centred design, and get people ready to go off and explore topics further. If you’ve attended one of the previous workshops, there’s no need to attend the new version.

This year, WUD is on November 8th, and I’ll be manning the Step Two Designs booth at the Sydney event. If you have some time, drop in and say hello. There will be lots of interesting things going on, and at our booth we’ll have lots of information to give away, as well as a lucky dip prize. I hope my t-shirt fits this year :)

Here are all the details:

The Usability Professionals’ Association (UPA) has proclaimed that World Usability Day 2007 will take place on November 8, 2007. This year’s focus will be on healthcare. World Usability Day was founded in 2005 with a global mission to increase the public’s awareness of the need to make services and products easier to access and simpler to use. Universal issues such as healthcare, education and government will be addressed through expert forums, exhibits, events and initiatives in over 35 countries.

The UPA Sydney chapter is organising a local event, which will take place at Telstra on Level 4, 400 George Street, Sydney, from 9am – 5pm.

The November 8th event will feature an impressive lineup of speakers addressing the importance of usability across all aspects of healthcare. The program will include presentations on:

• The importance of customer experience to a large corporate (Holly Kramer, Group Managing Director, Telstra Product Management, Telstra)
• Advanced telemedicine – Accessing health services remotely (CSIRO)
• User experience design of a hospital-based managed healthcare service (Telstra)
• The risks of medical equipment failing and why usability is important (Moray & Agnew)
• The impact of poor usability on people’s lives (Objective Digital)
• Accessibility – opening a new world to disabled people (Scenario Seven)
• Usable website development process – NSW Guardianship Tribunal case study (Web Usability)
• Trustworthy technology – Privacy and identity in the healthcare industry (Edentiti)
• Design thinking and usability (Telstra)

The day will also include interactive sessions and demonstrations of techniques such as usability testing and eye tracking, and will provide ample time to chat with people in the field of usability to learn more about it.

You are invited to attend any part or all of the day, and no pre-registration is required. The event is free, and open to the public.

For details of the program, please visit the UPA Sydney website or the World Usability Day website and look for the Sydney event.

A special thanks to the sponsors for this year’s Sydney event:

• Telstra Corporation
• Boomworks
• CHISIG
• CSIRO
• Digital Tsunami
• Epilepsy Action Australia
• Objective Digital
• PTG Global
• Step Two Designs
• The Hiser Group

See what people are blogging about: WUD07, World Usability Day