When the university gets around to redesigning the campus web presence, it will need to meet the following goals:
- Accessible
- Manageable
- Usable
- Findable
- Flexible
If implemented properly, Web Content Management would be a great tool for making inroads toward achieving the first three: accessibility, web document management, and usability.
By placing the onus for accessible templates in the hands of developers who understand accessibility and how to create standards based solutions, the campus can ensure that all new sites created in the WCMS are accessible.
A WCMS solution will also play a significant role in how manageable documents will be on the web. Centralizing and standardizing the workflow should make it easier for departments across campus to publish content to the web.
How usable the web site is will depend on many factors. One way to ensure good usability is through centralizing the creation of template sets with those who practice design with usability in mind.
Stay tuned for Part 2 of “Able-ity: Chico State’s Web Presence”
2 responses so far ↓
1 Tony // Oct 24, 2007 at 10:07 am
Of course those five goals are just one piece of the pie. What about things like credibility, relevance, etc.? We take those content-related elements for granted, mostly because we don’t write the content, but they have to be part of the goals of “redesigning the campus web presence”.
And what about identity, branding, message, and all the other marketing/branding goals?
My point is not to say that what you presented was flawed; only that pulling on the string of “redesigning the campus web presence” has consequences at all kinds of levels - including levels that we’re not really qualified to work on.
The only thing sadder than leaving such a project in the hands of IT people like us, is leaving it in the hands of people who are even less qualified in all these areas than we are.
2 scott // Oct 24, 2007 at 10:32 am
The things you’ve mentioned are absolutely valid. I suppose I could have rephrased that to be open to other goals, those were just the few that I chose to write about.
Branding, credibility, relevance… all valid things that will need to be remembered.