The politics of information design
Advanced Session, presented by David Sless.
It’s often said by information designers and architects:
this would have been a great project if it was not for the
politics
!
This is not an acceptable excuse. The politics is always there and a natural part of any project. If you don’t take the the political aspect of the work into account in a sophisticated way, and they overwhelm you, you have not managed the project professionally.
At last year’s conference I was critical of groups that stumbled when it came to dealing with the political aspects of large projects.
This year, I will outline the basic principles and methods needed for the political management of information design projects.
David Sless
David
Sless is Director of the Communication Research Institute,
Visiting Professor of Information design in the Design
Institute at Coventry University, Vice President of the
International Institute for Information Design, and an adjunct
professor at the Australian National University, and the
University of Technology in Sydney.
In 1985 he was invited to set up the organisation that became the Communication Research Institute, a not-for-profit group that undertakes research and provides information design services and advice to over 200 government and industry organizations around the world.
David is an advocate of evidence-based information design. His main research has been in information design methods.
David is a frequently invited keynote speaker at international conferences, and is the author of over 200 publications.
You can find David on Twitter as @davidsless.
Some Q&A with David
- What have you been working on lately?
- A large intranet site, and some risk management and communication projects
- What has been the biggest change with what you do in the past 5 years?
- There has been plenty of innovation through specific projects, but the largest change has been in our working methods. We have successfully moved over all our administration and project management to i-systems.
- What project that you were involved with are you most proud of?
- Over the last five years, our work in Mexico on medicine information for consumers has been both frustrating and rewarding. Two steps forward, three back, then one and a half step forward again. It is a long termn opportunity to make a big difference right across Latin America. We have planted a good seed. We hope it germinates and grows.
- What do you think will be the next big thing?
- A radical overhaul of information design processes that will affect how UX IA and ID professionals work in an environment that demands sustainability and measurable outcomes.
- Do you have any questions for your fellow speakers?
- What are you doing about ‘the next big thing’ above?
- Are there differences in handling politics from an innie vs. an outie perspective – should I pay attention to different aspects or choose different battles to fight depending on whether I’m an internal resource, or part of an outside agency?
- Politics is all about position: where you are in relation to all the others. One of the things I will elaborate on in my presentation will be what I call ‘the logic of positions’.
Do you have any questions for David or any of our other speakers?