Re: Information Architects; was: Re: job title nomenclature on biz cards

["Gene Kim-Eng" <techwr -at- genek -dot- com>]

I have had some experience in this area, and I have to say that the last
sentence in this quote
is by and large a pipe dream that up until now has been the downfall of most
attempts to
implement content management systems.  Most organizations don't "retire legacy
documentation, it just occupies space in networks forever until some future
upgrade in
infrastructure or tools suddenly renders it inaccessible, and outside of
narrowly focused
efforts such as technical manuals and web page design are *not* adopting new
tools and
processes to meet the demands of content or knowledge management.  To truly
capture and
manage your organization's total knowledge, you need to pull in content that
often doesn't
get into technical documents, such as design specs,. marketing collateral,
manufacturing
and test instructions, service and support records, etc.  The moment you tell
your engineers,
manufacturing, marketing, field service, etc. people) that they're going to be
expected to
"adjust" to the CMS/KMS by learning to use new tools and formats, you have
doomed it
to ultimate failure.  The CMS/KMS systems that will ultimately make content and
knowledge
management concepts work will be the ones that adjust to the way people work
*now.*.  This
*might* be possible with XML, *if* tools like word processors, spreadsheets,
databases,
etc., etc., migrate to configurations in which XML works under the hood of
familiar tools,
but unless the CMS/KMS can also handle the native file formats already out
there, it can never
really achieve its promise.

OTOH, I think Chuck's original mention of "information architects" was meant as
a comment
on technical writers attempting to inflate their titles to sound more impressive
by calling
themselves things like "information architects," "information developers,"
"information
engineers," etc., etc., ad nauseum, when they're still not doing anything more
than writing.

Gene Kim-Eng




----- Original Message ----- 
From: "David Neeley" <dbneeley -at- oddpost -dot- com>
> As in most such new developments, this one too has not been accompanied by
untrammelled
success. In many cases, the tools are only now beginning to emerge that will
increasingly empower
organizations.Inthetechnicaldocumentationsphere,themovementtoXML based
information represents
one part of this change. As legacy documentation is increasingly being retired,
organizations are
adjusting to new demands and capabilities that structured information offers by
implementing it in
new work.



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