Battling information overload

Remember the good old days when communication consisted of the company policy and procedures manual and a quarterly employee newsletter? Well, say goodbye to those days if you haven't already. Welcome to the days where communication has become a virtual publishing house for a myriad of both internal and external company communication.

Performance improvement booklets, employee review guides, safety manuals, leadership assessment and mentoring program guidelines, employee directories, corporate resource directories, graphic standards guides, operational models, organization charts, application forms, training and instructional brochures, benefits manuals and newsletters covering topics from A to Z are just a sampling. A Fortune 500 company will publish thousands of such documents annually.

Feeling overwhelmed? Well, so are company employees. As businesses strive to communicate more, information overload has developed as an all too common ailment throughout the ranks. Consider the department supervisor who must complete a 150-question employee evaluation for each of his 65-member staff, or the line operator, who has to pore through a list of 63 investment options contained within the company's new 401 (k) plan. Think how new employees must feel when presented with a 320-page three-ring binder to acquaint them with their new employer.

Bring on the Architects

Is there a doctor in the house? Probably not, but you might consider calling an information architect, a communication specialist who can cut through clutter and deliver salient information in a package that won't weigh more than the person who has to read it.

Information architects use principles of instructional design, educational psychology, and graphic design to reorganize information for more effective communication. Using graphic devices and text formats to navigate through complex data and make it understandable, and training and learning theories to create appropriate hierarchy for complex information, they give structure and order to pertinent information, and map out the best way to access it.

Information architects are a fairly new breed, but serve an increasingly important function. After all, communication glut in the work place is more than just an inconvenience, it may be the reason the reader never finds the needle in the haystack. This means employees may have difficulty understanding or may entirely miss essential information the communication department has worked so hard to develop and disseminate. The end result is poor performance and a waste of time and money.

The effect of information architecture is most profound among organizations that rethink and redesign entire lines of materials. But redesigning even one large document can deliver dramatic results. Such is the case with Supercuts, Inc., a chain of 1,100 hair salons, that worked with information architects to reorganize its operations procedure manual that is distributed to store managers throughout the country. "This manual is our bible," said Tammy Lukasik, management development trainer for Supercuts. "It's filled with crucial information for day-to-day operations, yet at 400 pages, it was hardly user-friendly. It was binder overload."

Supercuts needed a format that afforded managers easy access to vital information such as daily deposit information, employee reviews and safety standards. By using a variety of graphic devices such as strong headlines, boxes, shaded thumbtabs and callouts, their information was re-mapped into two-thirds of the original space, creating easier access and readability. "I was amazed at how simple it is to find what I'm looking for in the new manual," said Lukasik. "The key thought or idea we wanted to express was pulled from the text in a way that made your eyes stop there first."

Lukasik noted that because Supercuts employees were stylists - artistic, visually oriented people that create looks and image - it was difficult to get them to read much of the original manual. "We were in the habit of using pictures to break up text and draw them to important information, but...we discovered there are other, more effective ways of making text visual," she said. Super-cuts is now designing a new safety guide for managers that will roll out the first of the year. "We're using the same format and anticipate seeing a dramatic reduction in claims as a result."

Bechtel Group, Inc., a worldwide engineering and construction firm employing 18,000, now saves as much as an hour to an hour and a half of training time per employee with newly redesigned instruction manuals. According to Robert Silverforb, manager of human resources for subsidiary Bechtel National, Inc., enhanced information design can also improve performance. "Our leadership assessment tool for supervisors and managers was unwieldy at 150 questions and did nothing to open up dialogue between the leadership candidate and his or her supervisor. Since the candidate required the help of peers, customers and team members to complete the questionnaire, we had to make it brief," said Silverforb.

Their new document cut the completion time in half and opened up areas for comments in each section which form the basis for further dialogue and goal setting by the candidate. "Bechtel now uses the toot as a catalyst for discussion and as the basis for the candidate's professional development plan," he said. Silverforb also worked on the redesign of the company's performance review process which, in its original form, was what he called "an avoidance-adversarial process - the supervisors avoided it and the employees found it adversarial."

In searching for a better review system, Silverforb interviewed 20 corporations and found that no one was satisfied with their current review systems. "The complaint was the same from company to company; managers didn't want to take the time to complete the reviews and there was a general lack of interaction in the whole process," he said.

"In redesigning our system, we created a more user-friendly format that focused less on the form itself and more on the interactive process of review," said Silverforb. "Our new format requires employees and their supervisors to talk about development. Employees develop a set of objectives for the year, which are then discussed. A major objective of the changed format was to give employees ownership of the review process."

Good Information Is Good Business

Whether it's for improved job performance, better safety or increased productivity, more and more companies are recognizing that good information means good business. So the pressure is on to communicate. Smart companies understand that even the corporate telephone directory is an extremely valuable asset if it's organized effectively. It can and should be an indispensable reference tool that quickly and easily guides you to all other company resources.

One large insurance company discovered it could package its corporate mission statement (which has 36 points) into a personal planner/directory so that company goals are incorporated in each manager's business day. Each page of the planner focuses on a different goal, provides space for notes and includes pertinent tips from other business managers. The HR executive in charge of the project claims it's one of the few documents they've ever produced that employees kept and used.

Design for ROI

Few people consider the return on investment of their design decisions, yet the impact of good information design is often financial. San Francisco-based Wells Fargo Bank cut its printing costs for one small training manual by almost half, saving at least $100,000 and, as retail staff development vice president Roger Addison puts it, "an untold number of trees."

The bank is one of a growing number of environmentally concerned companies that has reaped more than just cost savings from redesigning its operational and instructional documents. "I think the most important thing we learned from this project is that information design is not about fancy graphics or color, rather it's about using strikingly simple devices to navigate through a sea of information," said Addison.

"We worked in one color only and incorporated very basic techniques such as placing the table of contents directly on the cover of the manual for immediate desktop reference," said Addison. "It's the simple ideas that made this manual so much more effective. The changes are almost subliminal, but our employees are really pleased with the results," he stated.

Information architecture has much to offer the HR professional who is faced with the arduous challenge of stepping up communication, yet keeping the information clear and concise. Even the forms that HR works with on a daily basis - health coverage forms, employment applications, etc. - can be improved to save time and costly errors. If you work in a business where instructional materials have reached the behemoth binder stage, then it may be well worth your time to evaluate the effectiveness of those materials and consider the value of information architecture.

Mark Johnson is president and creative director, The Understanding Business in San Francisco. He can be reached at (415) 616-6809 or [email protected]

COPYRIGHT 1997 International Association of Business Communicators
COPYRIGHT 2004 Gale Group