Diversity

The Information Architect with an identity crisis: Grace Lau

This blog post introduces another of the co-chairs for IAC21. When not planning the conference, Grace Lau is also the co-president for World IA Day, the nonprofit entity behind World IA Day (the annual event), and co-founder of DIA Design Guild, LLC, a design consultancy uplifting aspiring and transitioning UX designers and researchers.

Why did you get into Information Architecture?

15 years ago I learned about information architecture (IA) and felt there was finally a concept for making sense of the world. Initially, I saw it in terms of navigating the web and over time have come to know IA as a construct to understand the associations and perspectives that biases create. The way concepts are identified, related, and defined (information architecture) has a direct influence on not just wayfinding and navigation, but also one’s understanding and treatment of the world. For instance, how people work and collaborate, how misunderstanding begins, and how mental models are created are all based on a society’s, a culture’s, or even a person’s prescription of order.

One might ask: how do you make sense of the world, if you can’t make sense of your self? Establishing labels, defining them, and creating meaning and understanding from these concepts – those who create the labels and the space for others to understand them – set the tone and the power dynamics. This is the vested power in information architecture.

Information architecture is about identifying concepts. The journey of understanding my identity has wavered throughout the years as the labels expanded from personal to pan- identities, from Chinese, Chinese American, American-born Chinese (ABC) to Asian, Asian American, and Asian American Pacific Islander (AAPI), from hyphens to acronyms.

Information architecture is about understanding how concepts are related. From Massachusetts where I was born to California where I have established myself as an adult, I am constantly reminded to define myself, to affirm my relationship and association to places and people. Grace isA, isPartof, <instance: place, community, organization>.

Information architecture empowers me to ideate, iterate, and innovate my own identity. Instead of the one being labelled, I as an information architect create understanding and determine labels through building bridges. There’s so much power that comes in having an identity, an identity that is given and taken away based on a label or a name. It’s interesting yet ironic how much society is built around titles and roles, how a denial or perpetuation of a label can spell the difference between an oppressed or liberated sense of identity and being.

How did you become a co-chair of the IA conference?

As an introvert, I have been pulled into great “hallway conversations” about the information architecture and ontologies of pants, sandwiches, and television dramas at prior conferences, and these have been inspiring discussions about our craft and its practice. But it is this wider view of labels, who creates them, who lives within them, who lives under them, and what they do with, to, and for us as individuals and to our greater community that drives me to engage more deeply in the IA community that I call home. I trust that Teresa, Cassini, and Claire and I working together could ignite these conversations at this preeminent conference to this level.

What do you do as a co-chair?

Short answer: Lots of coworking sessions and late nights over Discord.

Long answer: I wasn’t sure what was expected of a co-chair. The IAC advisory board said, design the conference you want to see. And with this wider lens of the power of IA, that is what we have set out to do.

Planning a conference is hard enough any other year. Since the close of IAC20 in April, we have been organizing the logistics of this virtual conference in the midst of a global pandemic, taking into account time zones, social movements, and civil unrest in an election year.

“We’re in this together” is probably one of the most tired phrases of the pandemic. Each of us as co-chairs, and each of our 20+ volunteers have experienced this year differently, with different stressors, successes, and sorrows. We have worked together to ensure that each other has felt supported and had the resources necessary to create the conference we desired.

I focused on marketing communications and supported my co-chairs with curation, sponsorships, and conference experience. We identified systems and untangled how information was gathered and reused upstream and downstream.

Above all, we created a safe space for volunteers to share and connect. I intend for this sense of unity to transcend to the speaker and attendee experiences. We feel we have opened the aperture of the power and responsibility of IA with this year’s line-up of speakers and workshops. We expect IAC21 will carry forward the momentum of prior years’ discussions about the responsibility we carry as practitioners to do no harm, and further our introspection as a professional community into the harm that has been done and amplify our work to right the wrongs.

What’s next for you?

After the conference, and a long nap, I’ll continue to be involved in the community through World IA Day. Together with a global board of directors, I will be researching and working on ways that we as a global community can build up a greater awareness and understanding around information architecture’s power to provide a stronger societal impact. Abby Covert, Dan Klyn, and others founded World IA Day. I’m standing on their shoulders to move it forward.

I’ll also be focusing on developing DIA Design Guild, a design consultancy I co-founded to provide mentoring and apprenticeships for aspiring and transitioning user experience designers and researchers. I’m working with 8 apprentices now on a variety of open-source and nonprofit projects. These early-career practitioners will be well positioned to carry forth this good work, because they are being mentored and guided by the thought leaders of this community of practice, many of whom I have come to know through IAC.

The future is what we make of it and who we inspire to continue to create it.

Where can people find you?

Acknowledgements

Grace wishes to acknowledge the many individuals who contributed to the writing of this article with advice, feedback, and encouragement (in no particular order): Teresa Nguyen, John Khuu, Jennifer Du, Alesha Arp, MaShana Davis, Christine Lau, Mingxuan Ren, and Jessica Shakarian. The first draft of this article was written on February 12, weeks after the death of 84-year-old Vicha Ratanapakdee who was assaulted in San Francisco, California. This post is published 5 days after the deaths of the 8 people, 6 of Asian descent, in Atlanta, Georgia. Their names were: Soon Chung Park, Hyun Jung Grant, Suncha Kim, Yong Ae Yue, Delaina Ashley Yaun, Paul Andre Michels, Xiaojie Tan, and Daoyou Feng.

Making IAC21 more accessible: More on diverse, equitable, and inclusive event planning

We want to keep you in the loop of our efforts to make the 2021 information architecture conference more diverse, equitable, and inclusive. This article is a follow on to our action plan posted last month. We ask that you continue to hold us accountable and make suggestions for how we can continuously improve our efforts by emailing us at diversity@theiaconference.com.

Ask about your needs

As we work on making IAC21 more accessible, we need your input. Tell us what you need by taking the Conference Expectation survey. Your answers will help us learn more about you and your experience with IAC, along with gathering information on your preferences around conference activities (such as poster night, karaoke, game night) and features/functionality of digital tools (single platform for conference, chat, bookmarking).

Sample of the Conference Expectation survey

To keep the conversation going well after the survey closes, we established an email address (diversity@theiaconference.com) as a way to continuously collect feedback on your needs, comments, suggestions, questions, and the like on diversity, equity, and inclusion at IAC. We promise to consider all suggestions, and respond to you within a week. We want your voice to be heard.

Create an accessible suite of tools

The IAC planning committee is hard at work accessing communication platforms, activities, and other services that will provide an accessible conference for all attendees, speakers, and volunteers.

To start off, we created a rubric (a scoring guide) to help us evaluate platforms, including criteria such as whether the platform offers or supports synchronized captions for livestream content, transcription, keyboard shortcuts, screen readers, dial-in by phone or have a non-video conference option, alt text for images, and sign language interpretation. We are considering how individuals need to move around different platforms to find information on what’s happening when, where, and how.

Once a platform or platforms are selected, we will ask volunteers with accessibility needs to help us conduct “dry-runs” and create tip sheets to be posted on the conference website to make sure that the chosen platform(s) accommodate all attendees’ needs.

Provide checklists of best practices for attendees, speakers, and volunteers

As almost every meeting is virtual nowadays, many organizations have developed and shared their own tips and tricks for making the experience engaging and run smoothly. We want to take it a step further and offer best practices for making the conference more accessible for IAC21 attendees, speakers, and volunteers.

We are compiling a list of best practices, which we will share on our website for all attendees and volunteers. IAC21 speakers will be provided a similar list as part of our Speaker Studio. These best practices will include recommendations to use plain language in all communications; a requirement to make all presentation slides, posters, and videos accessible; us conducting an access check prior to live sessions, including checks to make sure that adequate lighting and high-quality audio is available.

Continuously improve with your help

Is there anything that we’re not thinking about or considering here? Tell us what you think about our plans and your prior experience with IAC, or provide suggestions for future improvements.

Planning to attend IAC21? Learn more about our theme.

Written by MaShana Davis with contributions by Agnes Kiss, Chiara Ogan, and Cassini Nazir

Toward a more diverse, equitable, and inclusive IAC21: our action plan

Following up on an article from June 25, 2020, we want to let you know how we’re taking action for the 2021 information architecture conference to be more diverse, equitable, and inclusive. We ask that you hold us accountable and make suggestions for how we can continuously improve our efforts.

Our action plan

Diversify our scholarship criteria

Since 2018, the IAC’s Scholarship Program has offered around 30 full scholarships—covering the cost of registration, airfare, and hotel—mainly to people of color. Vanessa Foss, Kunverj and IAC Advisory Board member, says that this initiative was born out of the need for more representation and to build awareness of the participation of people of color in the information architecture field. This year, we will continue our efforts with these same goals in mind, but we will expand our criteria to further highlight diversity, equity, and inclusivity within the field. Our scholarships will be available to:

Students identifying as black, Indigenous, or a person of color (BIPOC)
Students identifying as LGBTQIA+
Students with a disability
Anyone whose employment has been affected by COVID-19 or other circumstances

Create meaningful mentorship opportunities

Mentorship comes in different forms and at different times. The IAC is a space where mentorships are formed and continued. We have offered many opportunities for mentorship including portfolio reviews, 1-on-1 career advice sessions, and group mentoring. Besides these options, we want to ensure that we create meaningful opportunities to connect, learn from one another, and to continue to foster and build on these relationships well after the IAC. To do this, we will:

Establish a pledge for mentors and mentees to stay invested during and after the conference.
Create conference circles or birds of a feather sessions to encourage peer-to-peer learning.
Create a roadmap for the mentor-mentee relationship to aid relationship development beyond the conference.
Update our selection criteria for mentors to ensure a diverse selection of mentors.

Provide speaker support for new or novice IAC speakers

Speaking in front of a new crowd at an unfamiliar venue can be difficult, even if the topic is familiar. Recognizing this, now almost 10 years ago, Adam Polansky recognized this and started an effort to support new or novice speakers to the conference. This year, we will continue to support speakers at every stage of the process—from putting a submission together to rehearsing a talk. As we develop our speaker support program, we will all be able to share our plans for guiding speakers and presenters in adapting their content to the virtual environment.

Reimagine the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) Roundtable

“Diversity is going to the party. Inclusion is being on the party-planning committee.” [Verna Meyers]

We will continue our efforts, started in 2018 and continued in 2019, to offer a safe space to discuss issues, ideas, and solutions surrounding diversity, equity, and inclusion as they relate to the IAC and the field. Going virtual allows us to experiment and to offer a series of virtual roundtables. We will encourage first-time conference attendees and newcomers to the field to take part in the discussion to bring a fresh perspective. Following the sessions, we will compile the feedback from each DEI roundtable, translate these outcomes to action, and share this information with the community via the IAC blog.

Update our code of conduct and provide safe ways to report misconduct

The possibility for bad actors exists at every conference. With that, your mental, emotional, and physical safety is one of our priorities and will help to make a great experience, even for a virtual conference. The IAC Code of Conduct is reviewed annually to address any gaps or changes that are needed. We offer an anonymous reporting form in the case of misconduct.

Broaden our community

Representation matters always! IAC continues to recognize the need to diversify its community to ensure it has a variety of perspectives, experiences, skill sets, and knowledge. In the past, IAC has proactively reached out to Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) to increase student participation. However, we recognize outreach alone is not enough, and this year, we hope to expand IAC’s connection to all institutions of learning. To do this, we will:

Deepen our existing relationships with HBCUs.
Establish new relationships with community colleges, high schools, bootcamps, and other non-traditional information architecture, user experience, and design programs.
Identify and share information on non-traditional programs with the community.

Continuously improve with your help

We will provide ways for you to offer feedback on our efforts. The DEI Roundtable is one avenue, but in the meantime tell us what you think about our plans and your prior experience with IAC, or provide suggestions for future improvements.

Planning to attend IAC21? Learn more about our theme.

If you’d like to help, please sign up to volunteer for the IAC21.

Written by MaShana Davis with contributions by Cassini Nazir, Grace Lau, Teresa Nguyen, and Agnes Kiss.

Toward a More Inclusive IAC

Dear Information Architecture Community,

These are increasingly turbulent times. As we, the IAC21 co-chairs, meet to plan next year’s conference, we can’t help but reflect on the current protests and uprisings in the United States in response to the deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Tony McDade, and countless other Black lives taken from this world by the police and other forms of brutality. We mourn and grieve these losses and recognize that the pain felt by the African-American community is a continuation of the deep trauma resulting from over 400 years of systemic oppression, exploitation, and violence. As co-chairs, we acknowledge that we — and, quite likely, most of the members of the IA community — have not experienced the kind of systemic racism faced by the African-American community.

From its beginning IAC has been shepherded by Vanessa Foss of Kunverj, who writes:

“As the director of the IA Conference and as an African-American woman, I have noticed, not only over the recent years, but from the very first conference (when it was known as the IA Summit), the lack of diversity, especially when it came to black participants. So, about three years ago, together with the IA community, a scholarship program was started, in order to increase awareness about Information Architecture and participation by people of color. So far, about 30 full scholarships have been granted to people of color. We also plan to implement a mentorship program this year. I am proud of the progress that we have made so far and I am firmly committed to building on this foundation as we march forward together.”

Here are some things that IAC has been doing to address racial inequities:

As Vanessa mentioned, IAC’s Scholarship Program has offered about 30 full scholarships to people of color since 2018. The full scholarship, which will continue in 2021, includes the cost of tickets, airfare, and hotel.
Beginning with IAC20, IAC has proactively reached out to Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) to increase student participation. Outreach alone isn’t enough. This year we now have a first-ever student co-chair who will help to deepen university outreach.
IAC held a Diversity & Inclusion Roundtable in 2018, creating a roadmap aimed at bringing more diverse speakers and attendees. More needs to be done. In addition to bringing this back in 2021, we are, more importantly, looking at ways to translate these ideas into action.

This isn’t enough. As co-chairs, we will uphold the work already started to make the conference be more diverse and inclusive. Throughout our conference planning, we’ll post regularly on our progress. We don’t know what tomorrow looks like, much less what next year’s IAC might look like, but we all have profound work ahead.

Tell us what you think. And keep us accountable.

— Grace G Lau, Claire Morville, Cassini Nazir, Teresa Nguyen

P.S. If you’d like to help, sign up to volunteer: bit.ly/IAC21-Volunteer.