FW: What alternatives are there to "Information Mapping"?

[Kathleen Kuvinka <kkuvinka -at- epicor -dot- com>]

Maybe if you took an extra, oh, 2 seconds you could have read the table
headings, too. That way it would have taken you 5 seconds to find the
correct info, still an improvement. 

I bet the Info Mapping sales pitch comes across as somewhat of a con to some
people, especially considering the cost of their seminars. But you wouldn't
really know unless you have been there.

I agree that Info Mapping can't be applied to everything, as they claim. But
even if "nothing can be made more simple than it is", that doesn't mean a
difficult task has to be presented in a difficult way. Good presentation
doesn't imply oversimplification. 

And yes, a lot of the methods are common sense. A lot of writers must not be
using theirs.

-----Original Message-----

Now one could comment that this was all a set up that proved far less than
it pretended to, and that would be fair. But after a few minutes I noticed a
much more telling problem. The table was organized in three columns, Name,
Old Job, New Job. I realized that in the exercise I had found the name,
found a job title next to it, and raised my hand at once. But I hadn't found
the new job at all, I have found the old job.

Rewriting the memo had changed us from taking 30 seconds to find and act on
correct information to taking 3 seconds to find and act on incorrect
information. Not an improvement if you are writing operating instructions
for a nuclear power plant, for instance.

I don't want to pick on information mapping in particular. It is 50% common
sense, and 50% oversimplification. Alternative methodologies must
necessarily be the same. Simplified methods for doing inherently complex and
difficult tasks always have this weakness. Nothing can be made more simple
than it is.

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