Communication - Harder Than It Looks

Our professor showed this two minute clip on YouTube of a guy attempting to explain what an Information Architect is and does. It's a funny video. The woman keeps thinking that any other job he mentions in his explanation is what he does until he gives up and says, "Sure, why not?" to her last guess.

But let's be honest here there were problems on both sides of that conversation.

It starts out OK. She asks what he does and he says he's an Information Architect. Most people are after your job title when asking that question so no problem here. But once she asked if he was "like an architect, but" it was clear she had no clue what an IA does. At that point he should have given the simplest and most complete answer possible. Again, I like the one given by the The Information Architecture Institute since it doesn't use any jargon.

Instead, he only gives bits of information that don't really answer the question. She then starts guessing at what he does. When he does explain what an IA does he uses a bunch of terms she doesn't understand. So she guesses again and he gives up.

For her part, it makes absolutely no sense to guess that he does any other job he happens to mention. The "do you work in fashion" part came across like she was purposefully being difficult. However, I'm sure she felt the same about him when he said he isn't a designer and then described his job in terms of designing something.

I bring this up because one of the things that has been brought up multiple times in our classes is that IT communicates poorly with the rest of the business. I think that this works as an example even if he isn't actually in IT.