Hands up if you’ve heard of IA?

A few years ago I would have been surprised if anyone in government knew what on earth IA was. At my recent “Intranets in Government” seminar, nearly all those attending knew what information architecture was, what it was for, and knew you needed it.

Bad information architecture is one of the core reasons intranets (or any other website for that matter) don’t work. When your staff throw up their hands like the robot from Lost in Space and say “I can’t find anything” it’s usually because the information architecture just isn’t a good fit for the information you’ve got, or for the users who want to consume it.

Intranets don’t meet our expectations because many sites are structurally poorly designed and just plain hard to use [1].

One of the tricks to getting intranets to work, as we discussed in the seminar, is to have an effective information architecture — that is (amongst other things) a good:

• classification scheme for your content – one that works for content producers as well as for those who are going to want to find the information
• site structure — one that allows users to quickly find information
• page skeleton – with good visual flow of information and consistent placing of widgets, like navigation, breadcrumbs, branding, etc, on each of the pages throughout the entire site

As the AGIMO Better Practice Guidelines say:

IA is the foundation of good website design. It is about planning where information and services will be located on the site in the most convenient and logical way for users. Effective IA helps ensure that sites meet [both] business and user needs.

If you’re intranet isn’t working for you, then it’s time to get thee to an IA!

M

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[1]. Head, A.J (2003) Why research intranets fail. Business & Finance Division Bulletin • Number 123. Spring 2003