A Treaty is Signed.
Our reconciliation was prompted by a letter I composed which informed the
project leader(?) of what I believed to be an abuse of my right to
protect the integrity of our graphics. Since they had apparantly decided
to take this semi-completed project in-house, mid-stream, I offered
recommendations ("for the last time at my expense") to express what I
felt would encourage a successful project. I also expressed my assumption
that our involvement with the rest of this project would be minimal,
effectively freeing us to commit to other projects.
Last week, nearly 7 days after the delivery of my letter, I had a
one-on-one meeting, with a senior representative (at his request), at
which I received a sincere apology on behalf of the company and was asked
if my firm would be interested in continuing our work.
Who's in Charge?
During our meeting, I was told that the company had undergone many
changes - they were now a "flat(ter)" organization and had formed an
internal task force for this project shortly after we began development
(nearly 6 months ago). This explained my prior confusion (and theirs). On
all other projects, I worked directly with one person and that individual
had a supervisor who would ultimately approve our work. Now I'm working
with a committee that lacks leadership, accountability and the ability to
build a consensus. This is somewhat understandable, considering the fact
that web site development is relatively new and most clients are
rightfully skeptical of anyone (inside or outside of the organization)
who claims to be an "expert" in such a new field.
Advice from a Veteran.
IMO, the president of a company should serve as the content director of
the main (first) page of a web site. With his/her input, a preliminary
flowchart should be created that represents all primary branches. Once
the president determines, for example, that Investor Relations will be
included in the web site, a senior Investor Relations representative
should probably serve as the content director for the main page of
Investor Relations. Then, the preliminary flowchart is revised to include
each department with subsequent branches.
Meanwhile, each department is busy outlining the content for the
secondary, tertiary, etc. branches of their portion of the site while the
marketing director defines the target audience(s) and objectives of the
site and directs the efforts of each department. Once the preliminary
flowchart is complete and a rough text draft (or text outline) of the
site is available, have a good, creative (I know that's a scary word),
site developer refine the flowchart, assist with concept development and
begin constructing the site as the copywriter writes and edits the text.
BTW: Once a final flowchart is created, it will be much easier to predict
costs. Without this flowchart, you're constructing a high-rise building
without blueprints - a building you'll need to tear down in a few short
months.
The Mother of All Trenches.
In my case, the non-technical people on my client's task force don't
understand (and don't want to understand) the technical aspects of
constructing a web site. Consequently, these people have a tendency to
exaggerate the technical proficiency that is actually required to
construct a web site and the IS or technical people tend to underestimate
the talent and experience that is required for visual communication -
interface design, information design, graphic design, illustration,
copywriting, etc. In a situation like this, everyone becomes frustrated
and the gap in communication turns into the Grand Canyon. If this is
likely to happen in your organization, it is probably best not to have a
task force. Just have your marketing director work with your site
developer. A good site developer will ask very specific technical
questions and help to bridge the gap between IS and marketing.
Actual Mileage May Vary.
Obviously, this advice doesn't work for every kind of web site,
organization or situation. So please don't misunderstand - this is not
intended to be "The Book" on site development. You'll need to write your
own.
The trick for a medium to large corporation is to get a web site up and
running before the year 2000. :)
BTW: Special thanks to everyone who responded to my distress signal. Your
response(s) helped me compose a much more effective letter.
Tommy
_____________________________________________________________________
Tommy Oddo, Creative Director. . . . . . . . . e-mail: tommy@oddo.com
Oddo Design - a Marketing Communications Firm for the Information Age
Corporate Headquarters: &lt;a href="<a href="<a href="http://oddo.com/">http://oddo.com/</a>">http://oddo.com/</a>"&gt;http://oddo.com/&lt;/a&gt; . . . . .Voice: 713.531.8137
Oddo Design's Graphics Outlet: . . .&lt;a href="<a href="<a href="http://oddo.com/outlet_index.html">http://oddo.com/outlet_index.html</a>">http://oddo.com/outlet_index.html</a>"&gt;http://oddo.com/outlet_index.html&lt;/a&gt;
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