Holistic Project Planning

One of the great things about working in Interactive Media is that by nature it brings together a wide range of creative disciplines. I think that those of us who choose to work in this area tend to be people who like to wear more than one hat and think laterally.

One of the frustrations I often see as a Project Manager is the creative gap caused when the creative players are unable to see the project holistically. A common example of this is the disconnect between content and design that seems almost inevitable in web design. Content is often given little thought, in favor of concentrating on having a cool looking website. Either that or the content is so dense and over-thought that it interferes with designing something useful or elegant.

To do good interactive design, it is important to give each step of the process appropriate time and energy. Generally speaking, these steps include:

• Information Architecture
• User Experience planning/ wireframes
• Design
• Content creation/ gathering (writing, visual assets, videos, interactive demos, and, well… everything that is going into the piece)
• Code & CMS

Too often I have seen projects focus so intently on design and code that the other elements become afterthoughts. That may be OK for a four-page website, but if the content is rich and complex there needs to be a bit more planning, or you may end up with an unwieldy experience for the end-user. And that won’t serve you well.

A little bit of advance planning can save a lot of pain during the process. Here are some great things to do before engaging an agency to do interactive work:

1. Know your goals. What business strategy are you pursuing? What is your story, and who are you speaking to?
2. Do your homework. Find examples of interactive work that you like and that offers the kind of experience you want to create. Research the technologies available so you can discuss your options intelligently.
3. Wrangle your content. Determine what content exists already and what you will need to create or have created. I recommend creating a content inventory list before writing your Creative Brief.
4. Write a solid Creative Brief. The more detail you can provide about the project, the more accurate the bidding process will be. Also, a good creative brief can provide an invaluable roadmap for the project workflow. (This subject warrants its own post, so I won’t go into it here).
5. Get bids from a few agencies who do work you love. Work through the bidding process with them to make sure they understand your needs. You want to work with people you like, so take the time to get to know them a little.
6. Hire a writer, too. Many agencies will have in-house writers or writers they work with regularly. If you have a lot of content, or if you are delivering a complex message, this is important. Many people try to save money by writing their own content (and some people have the skills to do this, but not many). This should be someone who understands writing for interaction and also understands your content strategy.
7. Don’t underestimate the importance of IA. Having a solid information architecture that aligns with your content strategy will make everything run smoothly.
8. NOW start the design process. Don’t start before you have IA, wireframes, and a content list. Good design depends on these. Bad design is design for its own sake that gets content crammed in at the last minute.

Of course, all of this takes time, so start planning a few months before you want to start building and bear in mind that interactive projects can take anywhere from six weeks to two years or more, depending on complexity. Don’t sell yourself short by rushing the process, if you can avoid it.