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Enterprise Information Architecture
Summary
We hear a lot of talk about “digital transformation.” But isn’t that what we’ve been doing since the Web emerged in the late 1990s? Why is this still so aspirational for so many organizations? In his consulting practice with Factor, Bram Wessel sees first-hand how enterprise-scale organizations are awakening to the reality that the information itself that drives experiences and gets implemented in technologies —the Information Layer, if you will— is increasingly a tangible organizational asset. As such, it’s as critical as any other kind of infrastructure. Bram joins Lou to ponder where we’ve been and where we might be headed in the realm of enterprise information architecture.
Key Insights
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Information architecture evolved through three eras: technology, experience, and now the information era.
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Early enterprise IA efforts were often undervalued, seen as an afterthought to implementing technology like CMS.
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The information era recognizes information as a core organizational asset with real fiscal and strategic value.
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Successful IA requires organizational alignment combining grassroots practitioners and senior champions.
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Governance and a clear roadmap are critical to maintaining evolving information models within enterprises.
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E-commerce taxonomy cannot simply be copied from merchandising structures; customer-facing navigation needs different taxonomies.
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Many large organizations operate multiple unaligned information architectures across various systems causing costly data quality issues.
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Enterprise IA maturity can be modeled in five stages from accidental silos to mastery with continuous improvement.
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Taxonomy and ontology management tools like Synaptica, PoolParty, and Semaphore enable flexible, shared information models.
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Fast-paced agile environments require parallel tracks for production and information strategy development with stable onboarding processes.
Notable Quotes
"There was a naive belief that just implementing content management systems would automatically make great experiences possible."
"We’re entering an information era because information itself is infrastructure and has actual monetary value."
"You need both a bottom-up and a top-down approach to achieve organizational alignment for information architecture."
"Customers can’t buy products they can’t find, and often that’s because product content isn’t related to non-product content."
"Organizational information models need to grow and be managed, not treated as static deliverables."
"Our role often feels like being information therapists – understanding pain and helping clients align their information."
"The first stage we see is the accidental stage with silos and no consistent information across the organization."
"Mastery means information is a strategic asset with quantifiable equity central to business identity and operations."
"You don’t need everyone to agree on every term, but you need governance to decide roles and approvals."
"In agile, you can’t move fast and break information strategy; you need a parallel track to feed changes into production."
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