After the goals and objectives of the site has been communicated between us and the clients, we typically tries to understand the tasks and goals of the user.

As an Information Architect, I worked with project managers, designers, developers, content analysts, functional analysts, usability analysts, client business owners, and the client IT team to ensure that the website can fulfill the users' goals and tasks.

The workflow of the project starts from the Content Analysts to understand the user's goal and come up with a list of contents to be migrated under the new framework.

The information architect then tries to build a logical structure to support the content. In many cases, the structure of the information is in the form of a hierarchy. This may transform into the website hierarchy. The IA also need to consider the interaction sequence of the website.

The layout of the individual page is then defined carefully by the IA by considering the information needed on that page. A site schematics is created as a result. Sometimes a design specification is accomplied with the work.

I then work with the Visual Designers to come up with a consistent visual solution for the pages or elements within the page. If there are any issues arising, they are communicated and resolved between the IA and the designers.

The designers output a Design Composition to the Developers. Again, if there are any technical issues that relates to information architecture, the Developers need to communicate with the IA.

The job of the Usability Expert is then to test the prototypes produced by the Developers against the users. The Usability Expert then communicates any problems or insight from the test to the IA so that the IA can refine on the information architecture, and the iterative process continue.