Innovation Cultures - Thinking Innovation | Page 10

Intel , for example , is studying how transnationals use technology to stay in touch with their community back home and then applying this knowledge to guide technology strategy .”

WHAT INFORMATION ARCHITECTS CAN LEARN FROM DESIGNERS

by Mick Kahan & Teresa Di Cairano
So what does ethnography have to do with information technology professionals ?
In the last decade or so , IT professionals have borrowed from the discipline of architecture with the goal of creating more responsive IS services . However , there may be something else to learn from the field of design .
Leading practices in product and services design are undergoing a shift from designer-led approaches to more client / user-centric ones . 1 To get there , design researchers often use ethnographic techniques . Ethno … what ? Ethnography is a branch of anthropology that studies the social behavior of people within a culture . 2
Well , it turns out several notable IT firms from Microsoft to Intel and IBM employ these techniques with the notion that a better understanding of user needs means a more innovative and successful product . 3

Intel , for example , is studying how transnationals use technology to stay in touch with their community back home and then applying this knowledge to guide technology strategy .”
The idea is that better information technology design comes from a deeper understanding of client / user needs . Intel , for example , is studying how transnationals use technology to stay in touch with their community back home and then applying this knowledge to guide technology strategy . 4 How can we apply this to Information Architecture ? We know that the ubiquitous nature of the World Wide Web and Business Intelligence software has made users far more conscious of their own specific information needs . One way to synthesize these varying needs is the use of personas that express the information needs within a business culture .
Kent Bimson , PhD ( Intervista faculty and leading enterprise semantics consultant ), has identified the following personas within an enterprise ’ s information culture . Using the metaphor of a First Nations village , Dr . Bimson has mapped typical cultural roles to information usage patterns in the enterprise , and to the information architectures and services that would support them .
The Chief : Business intelligence for strategic advantage The Chief leads the business , plans business strategy , and makes critical decisions . Supporting information architectures for this type of client / user would typically include business intelligence , data warehousing and decision-support applications .
The Elders : Information to run daily operations The elders advise the enterprise leaders , implement policies and advise management . Here , information architectures tend to be structured to support mission-critical business transactions and ERPs and often provide real-time data and reports .
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