The end is not the end. You know that. đ
Last week, we had a meeting to talk about the Readability guidelines alpha. Thank you to all those who came. And a massive thank you to Deliveroo for hosting us with space, drinks, and nibbles. Thanks so much.
We talked about what worked, what didn’t work and what we would like to do next.
Summary.
We are continuing with another 10-week project to refine our approach and see if it works.
What went well.
The things that we felt that worked were:
- the intention – Â we can see the value,
- the links and discussion were posted were useful,
- a forum where people could share,
- people were passionate,
- good to tap into experience,
- deadlines,
- examples from people in the chat about where certain things worked and when it didn’t.
What didnât go well.
Couple of things we could improve:
- limited number of people were contributing,
- daunting to contribute – one comment was âI was worried it might come across as too much of my style guide. I was worried that it was irrelevant and boring.â,
- wiki and discussion space were fragmented,
- lost track of discussion thread,
- editorial versus usable – people were confused about what the comments should be,
- ran out of time and we âmissed the chance for people to pile inâ.
Research.
I said that our discussions regularly came back to research so I wanted to understand why we needed it and what research we needed. Comments were:
- only way to get decisions across [managers donât trust their content teamsâ expertise],
- research thatâs available is usually selling something,
- current research is not about usability,
- research is all over the place,
- can’t find any relevant research,
- different industries tested will come up with different guidance,
- âWe find stuff on the Internet, but there’s no quality-controlâ.
We talked about how people didnât trust existing research because it wasnât seen as ârelevantâ. For example, some universities donât trust anything but their own research. Some donât trust GOV.UK research because itâs government etc. We felt that if we found different examples from different industries, we might be able to get over some of these trust issues.
[Note: if all industries say the same thing, which is quite likely on many topics, ultimately, over time, our organisations might start trusting the guidance for other industries. Weâll have to see.]
Other comments.
What does readability cost us and what is it worth?
Small groups coming together might be able to get us further.
Super contributors might be a good idea.
Inclusivity – we agreed making content accessible is an aim but weâd call it inclusive so that people didnât just think of code.
Some people felt they were âlurkingâ – they read it all but donât contribute. Itâs very useful to consume but hard to contribute.
Time is a challenge.
Might as well stare this one full in the face. We all struggle with time. When we talked at the meet-up and on various channels, we can all see the value of this if we contribute but not many do.
We also talked about the challenge of being available at 7pm on a Tuesday.
So my challenge to you for 10 weeks: 30 mins a week.
For most, thatâs one commute. For one journey to work youâll commit to add something to the discussion on the current topic.
As Gerry McGovern says: “It seems we have time to do it wrong, but we never have time to do it right.”
This could help us get a lot of things right.
This is an opportunity.
Next steps.
We have decided to:
- take the next 10 weeks as a beta (project ends on December 18th, 2018)
- ask for volunteers to lead on topics
- make it inclusive – weâll spend time looking at the accessibility/inclusivity of all elements
We are also committing time from the fabulous Lizzie Bruce, one of our trainers. Lizzie has a bunch of ideas in mind so weâll keep you posted.
Super contributors.Â
Will you lead on a topic?
Each week we will set up a topic. You will lead. Youâll have your own slack channel (lucky you!) and everyone interested can dive in. When you have collected up guidance and research, from the people participating and from your own search for evidence, (like usability studies and academic research), you put it on the wiki. You can also do a short summary of what was discussed if you like, but donât worry if you havenât got time – Lizzie can jump in and help.
Rest of us.
We all dive in and support the topics when we can.
Remember: Slack is available all the time. If everyone supporting a particular topic can chat at one time, fab. If you canât, leave your comments so others can pick up later.
To clarify the point of this project.
We are looking at content elements, traditionally in style guides, to look at their usability. We will focus on:
- usability – have we seen content elements confuse users
- inclusivity – accessibility is usability
- research – what can we find and what do we need?
- all industries – weâll try and get information from as many industries as possible so our organisations are more likely to trust us
We are not looking at brand or tone.
If we canât find evidence, we will state that the decision is editorial and therefore, go with whatever we want! We should keep an eye on these topics to see if anything changes over time.
Iâd like us to keep a list of the research we might find useful if it doesnât exist. We can look at funding that later.
Have confidence.
The last thing I would like to mention is: have confidence. Â If you are thinking it, so are at least 5 other people. There are no stupid questions or comments. It might seem daft to you but it might be the first time someone else has heard of it. It might be the one thing that sparks an idea in someone elseâs head that leads us all to a solution. Donât keep it to yourself.
Be advised: itâs your perception that others may be bored by you. You have no evidence. Thatâs not very content design, is it? You need to test that and you need evidence.
So dive in.
Wiki:Â http://readabilityguidelines.wikidot.com
