1. MAPPING THE WAY FORWARD
Richard Ingram
@richardjingram
UX Scotland, 19th June 2014
#uxscot

2. OpenStreetMap of Boston, MA
So much to see and do and yet my stay was short.

3. Sketched map of Boston, MA
I didn’t need an accurate map. My friends edited out what I didn’t need.

4. ©TrusteesoftheBritish Museum
Babylonian map of the world
Clay tablet, probably from Sippar, southern Iraq (c.700-500 BC)
Babylon

5. ©TrusteesoftheBritish Museum
Hereford Mappa Mundi (‘Sheet of the World’)
Inked parchment, the largest medieval map known to still exist (c.1300)
London
Edinburgh

6. Administrative

7. Social

8. Military

9. Political

10. Walt Disney’s business map,1957
Depicts a central film asset and its supporting entertainment assets

11. Growth of Las Vegas, NV 1984–2012
Google Earth timelapse constructed from satellite imagery

12. Radial hierarchical organisation structure
About as complex and contradictory as its name suggests

13. John Rocque’s map of London, 1746
Rocque deliberately left out the city’s unsavoury elements

14. John Rocque’s map of London, 1746
Rocque deliberately left out the city’s unsavoury elements

15. John Rocque’s map of London, 1746
Rocque deliberately left out the city’s unsavoury elements

16. Map of organisation-wide content distribution
Or that giant hairball the cat coughed up yesterday. Equally yucky.

17. MAPPING OUT A STORY
Beyond physical geography

18. Wabash river
Ohio river
Mississippi river
©TrusteesoftheBritish Museum
Native North American buckskin map
Possibly used in land negotiations with the British (c.1744)

19. Distribution Distance
Overlap Direction
N
A
B
C
A
B

20. LIGHT
HEAT
SUN
gives
gives
Exploded view Concept map
Different maps, same basic
building blocks

21. Topological map Star map
Different maps, same basic
building blocks

22. North
South
EastWest
Find your coordinate system
Anything can be mapped using pairs of opposites

23. Find your coordinate system
Anything can be mapped using pairs of opposites
Expensive
Cheap
Slow Fast

24. Find your coordinate system
Anything can be mapped using pairs of opposites
High
Low
Small Large

25. Plot your landmarks
Start with the most prominent feature, then move outward

26. N
Plot your landmarks
Start with the most prominent feature, then move outward

27. FINDING OUR WAY
The unfamiliar environment

28. Content
ProcessesPeople
Tackling that complex trinity
Content governance is an important tool for this end

29. web

30. site?
We

31. use

32.
‘website’
Oh

33. well

34. ...
✓
✗
Maintaining content consistency is hard
Particularly when many contributors have other responsibilities
Style

35. query Content

36. Control

37. filter Publish

38. to

39. web
web-site?

40. Regional English Council
Approx. 15,000 staff
7 departments
Serving approx. 700,000
people
Scenario: Design a new content workflow

41. Digital Services department
(Our heroes)
Our varied, siloed environment
Some departments are responsible for 100s of pages,
while others only a few

42. Follow

43.
me!
Map Expert guide (Mandy)
Our varied, siloed environment
How to find our bearings in unfamiliar surroundings

44. Our varied, siloed environment
To discover how content decisions are made and how
they could be improved, we need to figure out who
best to talk to
Mandy
?
??
?
?

45. Let’s map our environment
Digital

46.
Services
Chief

47.
Executive's
Corporate

49.
Resources
Children

50.
and

51. Young

52.
People
Adults