IAC: Information Architecture Conference

Session type: Pre-Conference Workshop

  • Designing and Modeling Taxonomies for the Enterprise

    Designing and Modeling Taxonomies for the Enterprise

    2023 IA Conference

    March 28, 2023

    Beginner, Intermediate, Advanced

    This immersive workshop provides practical tactics for designing, building, maintaining, and governing taxonomies and ontologies. Based on hard-won lessons learned from work with everything from large fortune-50 enterprises to small ecommerce sites.

    The workshop provides:

    • Taxonomy/Ontology basics: a foundation to start creating a consistent vocabulary within your organization. We also call out the unique needs of building a taxonomy to serve the needs of large enterprises.
    • A framework for shifting to an enterprise taxonomy model that meets the needs of your enterprise and the individual business units, systems, user profiles, and interfaces.
    • Discussion and activities about the impacts of a taxonomy project on technology, governance, workflows, marketing, analytics, search, compliance, and the interaction with master data management
    • Practical tips for providing stakeholders with resources to navigate internal tensions around implementation
    • Examples and case studies of large scale enterprise taxonomy projects.

    Gary Carlson
  • Archetypes: An Input to Structuring Information Based on User Intent

    Archetypes: An Input to Structuring Information Based on User Intent

    2023 IA Conference

    Intermediate

    No longer accepting registrations

    as of March 5, 20230

    Come learn how to define and apply Archetypes, a new method for modeling users that supports the design of resilient information structures by focusing people’s intent and the jobs they want to do. A resilient structure is one that understands and accommodates the forces present in its environment. In the digital environment there are many forces at play–business needs, market trends, implementation technology, and the nature of the information–and the most important force is the intentions of the end users. 

    This workshop will introduce you to archetypes and walk you through the process of creating and applying them. Example case studies will serve as practical examples of what works and what doesn’t.

    Join us in this workshop to learn methods for defining bespoke Archetypes for resilient ecosystems, websites, and apps!

    This workshop will introduce archetypes as a new model of users and give you the information, tools, and experience you need to try an archetypes user model on your next project.

    Join us in this workshop to learn methods for defining bespoke Archetypes for resilient ecosystems, websites, and apps!

    Grant Carmichael
    Joe Elmendorf
    Joe Elmendorf
  • Advanced Information Architecture for large enterprises: working across systems, platforms, scale and time in large-scale information environments.

    Advanced Information Architecture for large enterprises: working across systems, platforms, scale and time in large-scale information environments.

    2023 IA Conference

    March 29, 2023

    Intermediate, Advanced

    This workshop provides a framework to address scale in enterprise information environments, so you can create information architectures that are more coherent across systems and platforms, more resilient to organizational evolution, and more sustainable and useful over time as the organization changes.

    Workshop activities focus on practical, real-world examples with common enterprise systems like SharePoint, ServiceNow, Workday, SAP, OneDrive, Box, Slack, Teams, and low-code application environments like Appian and Power Platform.

    This workshop adds two key tools to your toolbox:

    1. 5 methods to model and map complex, large-scale information environments
    2. IA heuristics tailored to enterprise IA

    These strategies will help you improve cross-channel and cross-system coherence, search and findability, knowledge management, change management, and governance in medium- to large-scale enterprises for all employees.

  • Information Architecture Essentials

    Information Architecture Essentials

    2023 IA Conference

    March 29, 2023

    Beginner

    Are you new to information architecture? This workshop teaches you the basic things you need to design digital places where information is easier to find and understand.

    Jorge Arango headshot
    Jorge Arango
  • How to Diagram

    How to Diagram

    2023 IA Conference

    Beginner, Intermediate

    No longer accepting registrations

    as of March 13, 2023

    Diagrams have been helping people for thousands of years across industries, fields and cultures. It seems like diagrams are everywhere if you are paying attention. But when were we taught to diagram? And were we ever taught how to know if a diagram is any good? For too many people, the answers are never and no.

    In this half-day workshop you will learn the purpose, process and craft of diagramming with a core focus on useful starting points, words of advice and level-ups for your next diagram.

    Students will be asked to bring a diagram to class so fellow students can critique them. We will be using a B.I.N.G.O card based on principles from the lecture material. Bringing diagrams from your past is not required but is VERY encouraged.

    Abby Covert
    Abby Covert