Seth Earley

Seth Earley of Earley & Associates Uses the Knowledge He Gains from the UI Conference to Better Communicate with His Clients

Seth Earley
President and CEO, Earley & Associates
Attended UI13

Seth is the founder of Earley & Associates, an information management (IM) consulting company specializing in taxonomy, content management strategy, search integration, usability and IA.

Why did you attend the UI conference?
Most of the work we do at Earley & Associates has a technical focus. I feel it’s important to hear current perspectives, approaches and methodology in the usability area so we can better understand how it complements what we do. What I learned at UI13 helps me better communicate concepts and approaches we take with business leaders.

Can you give an example of something you learned at the conference that you put into use yourself or with someone on your team?
We added some agile development ideas to what were currently practicing. We have a lot of discussions with our clients to figure out the developing requirements for their projects. Aligning high-level goals with tasks is something the executives expect. UI14 gave some insight on approaches to align goals and tasks that was really helpful

What did you find most valuable at the conference?
The breadth of experience and diversity of perspectives and opinions is amazing. It’s nice to see another angle and approach on how others look at core methodology for IA and taxonomy. The speakers are of high quality, the material is fresh and it’s a well produced conference.

Would you recommend this event to others?
This is really useful for anyone implementing tools and technologies and for the business analysts gathering requirements for projects. Developers and analysts often make assumptions on what users need and how they solve problems. This conference helps them really understand their user better and the steps they should go through to get the data and techniques needed.