Disassembled Rubik

I am now actively engaged in redesigning a website for a government entity that in its current state is nothing short of a Rubik’s Cube. I am now in process of breaking the cube apart in order to put it back together again. Here is an outline of my plan to improve the website user experience:

Principles Based Audit – “Walk” through the existing website and identify interaction issues by qualifying them against a list of design principles. The design principles are adapted from Cooper’s book “About Face 3″.

Personas – Idenitify who the target audience is and what activities they are engaged in. Identify each persona’s motivations and intent; identify value(s) that can improve user interaction with the website.

Information architecture – Taxonomies & Vocabularies. Discover, break, and redesign how the content is organized by leveraging user goals and stories.

Stories - Interaction narratives that illustrate how a persona uses the application to perform an action.

Principles Influenced Changes – UI sketches, paper prototypes, wireframe clickthroughs.

Brand Words – Leaning towards “Mature”, “Secure”, “Stable”.

How do we want the audience to feel? – “Supported”, “Guided”, “Understood”.

Visual Language – Comps (a.k.a., mockups)

Integrate Visual Design with New Interaction – High-fidelity comps of primary and secondary layouts and component interactions.

Integrate New Interaction with Technology – Support the Developers as they hook it all in.

Wash, Rinse, Repeat – Continuously improve.