The discomfort and messiness in big projects (and how to get past it)
Lauren Tormey (she/her), Senior Content Designer at The University of Edinburgh
The bigger the project, the more complex it is. And those complexities make things messy, and sometimes uncomfortable.
The Prospective Student Web Content team at the University of Edinburgh is currently in the middle of a big, multi-year project, developing a new content management system to deliver their prospective student website used by over 11 million users each year.
Over a year in and this project has had its fair share of uncomfortable and messy experiences, including:
a rocky start in project leadership
collaboration difficulties trying to get colleagues across disciplines aligned
a content design challenge around entry requirements so complex it felt like a big project within another big project
In this talk, Lauren Tormey, Senior Content Designer, will share her perspective on the challenging experiences the team has faced along the way, how they tackled them, and what they learned
Takeaways:
The importance of creating an open team culture where colleagues feel comfortable speaking up
Strong collaboration and alignment require constant maintenance
The biggest content design challenges are most likely people challenges.
Bio
Lauren Tormey (she/her) is a Senior Content Designer at the University of Edinburgh, where she has worked since completing her undergraduate degree in Linguistics there. She leads a team of three content designers who form part of a larger multi-disciplinary design team, focused on improving the University’s digital provision for prospective students.
In her eight years in higher education, she has used her editorial, CMS, and UX skills to support the creation and maintenance of more effective, human-centred content.
In her spare time, Lauren is a keen runner and an advocate for a more humane immigration system in the UK.
