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JONATHON COLMAN


CONTENT DESIGN LEADER, KEYNOTE SPEAKER

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HELP MARCIA WALK AGAIN

by Jonathon Colman Posted on September 26, 2016

Please donate or share from this YouCaring page to help Marcia Huhta walk again.


MARCIA HUHTA NEEDS YOUR HELP

You may not know my mother in law, Marcia Huhta, but on June 6th, Marcia’s life
changed forever.

That’s the day that Marcia and her husband, Matti, survived a head-on car
collision.

Marcia was rescued from the wrecked vehicle with the jaws of life and air-lifted
to a hospital for life-saving spinal surgery. But months later, Marcia’s in a
wheelchair and has limited movement and sensation below her neck.


DONATE OR SHARE TO HELP MARCIA WALK

That’s why my wife and I are raising money to help Marcia get the medical care
she needs to walk again.

Please donate—but if you can’t, please SHARE THIS LINK:
youcaring.com/marcia-huhta-654257

It’s not enough to just like or heart this—every share counts! Facebook,
Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn… fire up your MySpace again. YouCaring says that
every share is worth about $37 on average, so if you can’t donate, please
consider sharing this with your friends—and ask them to do the same!


ABOUT MARCIA HUHTA

Marcia and Matti Huhta dancing at their 50th wedding anniversary.

Marcia Huhta is a loving mother of five children, grandmother to three, and
great-grandmother to another two. She’s a lector at All Hallows Church, which
she attended daily. Marcia was also an officer in the local Finnish-American
Heritage Society for years. She also worked as a nurse at the Villa Maria
Nursing & Rehabilitation facility for over 3 decades. Marcia is adored by her
family, patients, colleagues, and her local community.

But there’s more: Marcia loves to dance. Square dances, waltzes, foxtrots, lindy
hops, charlestons… watch the video above of Marcia dancing a polka with Matti at
her 50th wedding anniversary. She performed with the Revontulet Dancers, a
non-profit Finnish dancing troupe in Massachusetts.

Marcia has rhythm on her feet, a rhapsody in each step, but more than that, she
also has grace—a rare gift given to someone who gave so much to her family, her
patients, her church, and her community.


HOW YOUR DONATIONS HELP MARCIA

Marcia and Matti Huhta need your help—please donate or share at YouCaring.

We’re asking you to give Marcia another gift: your donations. Marcia needs
long-term care, the best treatments, and world-class physical therapy to walk
again, to dance again, even to hold her great-grandchildren again. And these
treatments are out of her and her husband’s financial reach.

Your donations will pay for expenses like:

 * Colossal medical bills that have spiralled out of her family’s control
 * Long-term care in a skilled nursing facility that provides physical and
   occupational therapy
 * Improved treatments and therapies focused on helping her build strength,
   reduce pain, and stay healthy
 * Technologies that connect her with family & friends, since she’s unable to
   leave the facility she’s in
 * Additional medical care, transport, consultants, treatments, and other needs

Please donate to support Marcia on YouCaring. Your donation goes directly to
Marcia and Matti Huhta and you’ll only be charged a credit card transaction fee.


LET’S HELP MARCIA WALK AGAIN

Marcia Huhta’s life has changed forever, and we’re going to change it again—by
getting her back on her feet.

We want to see her walk, we want to see her dance, we want to see her hold her
great-grandchildren again… but we need your help.

Please donate now!

Posted in Life, Love | Tagged family, fundraiser, help marcia walk, marcia huhta
| Comments Off on Help Marcia walk again


WICKED AMBIGUITY AND USER EXPERIENCE

by Jonathon Colman Posted on May 21, 2015

Following are the video, slides, description, and transcript for my keynote
talk, Wicked Ambiguity. See the acknowledgments for more information about my
sources, influences, and the people who helped me along the way.


VIDEOS


WEBSTOCK 2017—DAY TWO OPENING KEYNOTE




MIDWEST UX 2016—CLOSING KEYNOTE




CONFAB CENTRAL 2015—OPENING KEYNOTE




SLIDES






DESCRIPTION


WICKED AMBIGUITY AND USER EXPERIENCE

How do you solve the world’s hardest problems? And how would you respond if
they’re unsolvable? As user experience professionals, we’re focused on people
who live and work in the here and now. We dive into research, define the
problem, break down silos, and focus on people’s intent to create solutions.

But how does our UX work change when a project lasts not for one year, or even
10 years, but for 10,000 years or more? Enter the “Wicked Problem,” or
situations with so much ambiguity, complexity, and interdependencies that—by
definition—they can’t be solved.

Using real-world examples from NASA’s Voyager program, the Yucca Mountain
Nuclear Waste Repository, and other long-term UX efforts, we’ll talk about the
challenges of creating solutions for people whom we’ll never know in our
lifetimes. The ways we grapple with ambiguity give us a new perspective on our
work and on what it means to build experiences that last.


TRANSCRIPT


INTRODUCTION

Let us go then, you and I,
When the evening is spread out against the sky
Like a patient etherized upon a table;

Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,
The muttering retreats
Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels
And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells.


Oh, do not ask, “What is it?”
Let us go and make our visit. (source)

Welcome to Wicked Ambiguity, a journey through time and space spanning 2.8
trillion years and 1.2 quadrillion miles.

This talk isn’t about me or my work. It’s about you and why you matter.

I’m dedicating this talk not to J. Alfred Prufrock, but instead to Leonard
Nimoy. While he’s best known for “Star Trek,” you may not know that Leonard was
also the host of TV’s “In Search Of…,” in which he looked for answers to
long-standing mysteries of the unknown.

And you know what? You do that, too. We’re all just nerds looking for
answers—and Leonard helped make it safe for us to be geeks, to be introverts,
and to be fascinated by the universe that surrounds us.

“We’re all stories in the end,” (source) after all, so I won’t say rest in
peace, but rather, “Live long and prosper.”


ABOUT OUR JOURNEY

> Don’t worry, everything’s going to be fine.

I’m your host for the next hour while we boldly go through the vast reaches of
time and space. I’ll make sure none of us gets lost and everyone makes it back.
But fair warning: the people who return won’t be the same as the ones who leave.

Got somewhere else to be? No worries! You can get these slides now at
bit.ly/raycats—don’t worry, I promise that’ll make more sense by the end. Note,
you need to use all lower-case letters or the link won’t work.

Let’s start with a memory; most things in the past do.

Do you remember being a child and your parents telling you, “Don’t worry,
everything’s going to be fine.” (source) But you really thought they were lying
just to make you feel better because it was dark, you were scared, and you
didn’t know what to expect?

Kind of like in this keynote? Well, then. “Don’t worry, everything’s going to be
fine.”

It’s a story we tell to project confidence and security. But it’s a hard promise
to make. We can’t even predict the location and movements of a single atom—let
alone complex things like world events, the stock market, or whether it’ll be
nice out on Thursday.

So maybe, just maybe, everything’s not going to be fine. What then?

This symbol is taken from one of the Pioneer satellites launched by NASA in the
‘60s. It was also used on Voyager, the furthest man-made object from the Earth,
spinning from out of the blue and into the black.

Today we’ll talk about this symbol and what it means. We’ll also cover a lot of
science and math, but almost no science fiction—even though the ideas we’re
discussing are fantastical. But other than quotes from books and TV shows like
“Doctor Who,” everything you’re about to see is real. It’s true. And it’s
troubling.

Some of you will leave today saying “This talk has NOTHING to do with user
experience!” Others will say, “This talk has EVERYTHING to do with user
experience!”

Guess what? You’re both right. Continue reading →

Posted in Life, Work | Tagged ambiguity, conferences, doctor who, keynote,
public speaking, raycats, science, user experience, ux, wicked problems | 9
Comments


WHY YOU SHOULD GO TO CONFAB

by Jonathon Colman Posted on March 11, 2015

Welcome to Confab Central: the content strategy conference in Minneapolis,
Minnesota. © Sean Tubridy/Brain Traffic (used with permission)

This post is nearly two years too late.

I should have written it back in 2013 after I attended Confab Central in
Minneapolis for the first time. The conference had already been around for a few
years and I thought that I was late to the game. I was worried that I’d come
across like a real n00b, out of my league and behind in the conversation.

But it wasn’t like that at all. There were so many smart people there, good
people, the kind of people where the conversation just keeps on flowing on its
own. I learned so much, hugged so many folks, laughed so hard I spilled my
coffee (again, my apologies to the Hyatt Regency). They were so open, so
welcoming—it almost felt like coming home.

But now it’s 2015. I’ll be giving the opening keynote at Confab Central this
year. So this post is late—I should have written it back in 2013 because now you
won’t believe me when I tell you about Confab. You’ll say I’m biased.

So let me be clear about this: when it comes to Confab, I am biased. Extremely
biased. Biased like your Aunt Suzy.

But I’m not biased because they’re paying me—I can’t accept any payment for
speaking, so instead we’re making a donation to Girls Who Code, a great
nonprofit with a mission I believe in.

Rather, I’m biased because the experience of attending Confab is just so
amazing. And I want to share that bias with you openly, in plain sight, so that
you can experience the same things I have.

Here’s why you should join me at Confab Central this year. Continue reading →

Posted in Work | Tagged confab, conferences, events | 7 Comments


SECRET WARS

by Jonathon Colman Posted on February 25, 2015

© Jennifer Tomaloff (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
Cross-published on Medium.

In 1984—when they told us that the Soviets boycotting the Olympics in Los
Angeles wasn’t such a big deal, really—Marvel Comics published Secret Wars. It
was such an amazing comic book series… nothing like it had ever been done
before. Heroes and villains from dozens of separate titles all duking it out
together over the course of a year.

To my hungry, nine-year-old eyes, it was hard to tell who the heroes were
because sometimes they turned out to be the villains. And some of the villains
were really just misunderstood heroes. To me, it was the very peak of drama.
Every panel was like a movie, each issue an epic.

What I didn’t understand at the time was the series’ political parallels: Ronald
Reagan was running a secret war of his own, quietly selling arms to Iran to fund
rebel forces in Nicaragua.

So I devoured each issue like an addict, flipping the pages at a staccato pace.
And my addiction spread quickly—Secret Wars made me a comics fan for over a
decade. And as I grew up, it lead me to bigger (and better) stories.

Stories like these three, which are about the real secret wars. They’re the dark
battles that remain unspoken, lurking on the fringes and hiding in plain sight.
They’re the conspiracies of silence caused by the things we can’t say.

Those are wars, too. We wage them with the people closest to us, but never admit
to their existence… or to the damage they cause.

The things that hurt us the most are the ones we can’t speak of. They pull at us
in the smallest, the most intimate of ways. They break us with their banality.
Or sometimes they just break us.

Here are three stories from the front. Continue reading →

Posted in Life | Tagged addiction, comics, death, depression, drugs, family,
politics | 25 Comments


HOW TO GET ONE MILLION VIEWS ON SLIDESHARE

by Jonathon Colman Posted on May 27, 2014

One million views on SlideShare… and counting.
Image © SlideShare

On the week of January 12, 2014, I cracked the one million views mark for my
presentations on SlideShare. I’m now well on the road to two million.

I’m definitely not the first (or the only) one to reach this point. Many
presentations have hundreds of thousands of views – a few even have millions.
And since several publishers on SlideShare are quite prolific, there must be
numerous accounts who have reached – and far surpassed – this sum.

Even so, I did a happy dance. Can you blame me? I was an early adopter of
SlideShare; my first upload dates back to July 21, 2007. That’s nearly seven
years’ worth of use. I started using SlideShare less than a year after posting
my first tweet and first status update on Facebook.

You might be aware that there are benefits to being an early adopter of a
nascent network. Even so, if you’ve ever seen me speak, then you know that a
favorite topic of mine is my own non-exceptionalism. I can’t think of anything
I’ve done that anyone else couldn’t do (or do better).

So I believe that with the right methods and approach, just about anyone can
reach one million views on SlideShare. My goal is to help you do that.


DO GREAT WORK THAT’S WORTHY OF BEING SHARED



Out of all of my presentations, the above talk on core values is my favorite. It
took me seven years of practice to create something of this level of quality. It
may not be a big accomplishment to you; that’s okay – it was to me. And
hopefully I can do much better work in the future.

While it should go without saying that we have to challenge ourselves to do the
best we can, how would you explain why there are so many bad presentations being
given so often? To understand, we have to start from a position of empathy; I
think that the majority of bad talks aren’t given on purpose.

Most of the time, I think that speakers are in a rush, or haven’t prepared well,
or are nervous, or are distracted, or don’t understand how to design slides, or
don’t want to speak in the first place, or feel intimidated, or aren’t held
accountable to give a good performance, or any number of other factors and
challenges. I certainly know what all that feels like; I’ve given bad talks
under circumstances just like these.

The good news is that all of these problems can be solved, all of these
weaknesses can be improved upon.

Don’t believe me? Take a look at my first few presentations. I leave them online
in my SlideShare account to remind me of how I started out – with no natural
talent, design sense, or storytelling ability.

My recent talks look much better and have far more views and shares.

The rest of this post explains is an introduction to how I made that happen.
Continue reading →

Posted in Work | Tagged community, conferences, content marketing, inbound
marketing, presentations, public speaking, slideshare | 36 Comments


HOW TO HACK YOUR SELF-REVIEW

by Jonathon Colman Posted on January 6, 2014

Hack your review, hack yourself.
Photo © johngineer

Once again, it’s time to write your annual self-review. Just like last year (and
the year before), Review Season sneaked up on you when you weren’t looking.

Now you’ve landed on this page after raiding Google for tips and tricks, hoping
to find some secret key or formula that will help you ace your written
self-evaluation so that you can get back to… well, whatever it is you’re doing
instead of preparing for your review.

No such luck. There’s no hidden back door, no algorithm to fool, no “one weird
trick” to get around evaluating yourself and your actions.

If you were successful in your work this year, you’ll need to weigh the merits
of touting that success versus coming off like a braggart. But if you failed to
meet your goals, then you’ll need to decide how to handle being accountable for
your actions or whether you’ll blame circumstances, your colleagues, or that old
favorite, “The System”.

Sound familiar? It’s a painful scenario experienced by workers all around the
world. But reviews shouldn’t be so binary. And they shouldn’t be dreaded,
either. Accountability has somehow become a dirty word in our lexicon… a tool
that’s wielded like a cudgel when it should instead be seen as being more like a
warm blanket.

Because reviews can be hacked, just like any other system or process. Hating on
reviews only displays a lack of imagination. And you’re better than that — I
know it. Continue reading →

Posted in Work | Tagged annual evaluation, annual review, content, content
strategy, evaluation, hacking, lifehacking, review, self evaluation, self
review, writing | 4 Comments


GUEST POST: ON GIVING

by Jonathon Colman Posted on December 24, 2013

Ed. Note: This post was anonymously written as part of Blog Secret Santa and I’m
extremely grateful to the author for creating such a thoughtful post. There’s a
list of all Secret Santa posts, including one written by me, on Santa’s list of
2013 gift posts.

On Giving.
Photo © Shereen M


ON GIVING

I can still remember the first time I read The Gift of the Magi. Reading it
today is one of my favorite holiday traditions.

My mother had brought home a special edition of the story book complete with a
red velveteen slipcase and the title embossed in beautiful script letters on the
cover. It sat on our coffee table for all of five minutes before I gave in to
the allure of its gold-gilded pages.

I recall feeling the lump in my throat as I read about the main characters, a
couple of modest means, Jim and Della, who sold their most prized possessions
only to unknowingly buy each other gifts that they would both no longer be able
to use.

In the end it didn’t matter. In the end, the act of giving the gifts was greater
than the gifts themselves. Real life works this way too.

Just like the many others who’ve read the tale before me since it was first
published over a hundred years ago, I was deeply moved. I may have even got a
bit misty-eyed.

But look beyond the cosmic irony of Magi’s mechanics and you’ll see actions
universally held as noble and good. Actions like thoughtful consideration for
another person’s needs and desires, and sacrifice for the sake of someone else.

Stories like these resonate with something deep inside us, because we all want
to give and receive that sort of gift. Continue reading →

Posted in Guest Post | Tagged blog secret santa, christmas, content strategy,
empathy, gifts, holidays | Comments Off on Guest Post: On Giving


I’M JOINING THE CONTENT STRATEGY TEAM AT FACEBOOK

by Jonathon Colman Posted on July 8, 2013

Life doesn’t slow down, so you’ve got to keep moving.
Photo © Dave Morris

Life doesn’t slow down.

It keeps moving. It won’t wait for you to catch up. And it never gives you a
chance to catch your breath.

In just the first half of this year, I completed my master’s degree in
information management at the University of Washington, a two-year program that
culminated in a massive content auditing capstone project. I spoke at eight
events, presenting a total of 536 individual slides. One of my decks even went
viral, attracting close to 300,000 views as well as a mention in The Huffington
Post.

I wrote a handful of blog posts, including this hand-curated list of 200+
content strategy resources. I also guest-blogged, I mentored, I did informal pro
bono consulting and Q&As with a number of organizations… but mostly I met
people, and I listened, soaking up information and perspectives and new ideas.

Throughout all of that, I also worked a full-time job at REI as their Principal
Experience Architect. I worked on a mix of information architecture projects,
content strategy, and business analysis and planning. REI’s been incredibly
forgiving of my disheveled appearance, my apparent lack of interest in shaving,
my constant yawning and bad habit of falling asleep at my desk.

And that’s no small feat with a stand-up desk, let me tell you.

So it’s been a busy six months. But even so, I’m not truly weary… I’m energized.
And since life doesn’t slow down, I’m going to speed up.


TRANSITIONS

The welcome sign at Facebook corporate HQ in Menlo Park, CA.
Photo © Marcin Wichary

Later this month, I’ll be joining the amazing Content Strategy team at Facebook
down in Menlo Park, California. I’m blown away by their talent, their empathy,
and the sheer scale of their accomplishments, not to mention the challenge set
before them: iteratively crafting content experiences that will be used by over
one billion people. Continue reading →

Posted in Life, Work | Tagged career, content, content strategy, core values,
facebook, REI | 54 Comments


INFORMATION ENDURES: A STORY ABOUT STORIES

by Jonathon Colman Posted on April 24, 2013

Ed. note: Each year, the UW Information School (where I’m a grad student) holds
its annual Dean’s Club Dinner to thank its donors and board members for their
gifts and service. This year, I’m emceeing the event along with fellow iSchool
students Amanda Jasso (MLIS, 2013) and Amado Robancho (Informatics & HCDE,
2013).

As part of my duties, I was asked to speak about my life, what brought me to the
iSchool, and how I hoped to use information to bring value to people. It turned
out to be a bit wonky; keep in mind that I wrote this for information
scientists. But it’s also part stand-up comedy, part nostalgia for 1980s tech,
and part dreaming about the future.

I’m grateful to the iSchool for asking me to share my story.


INTRODUCTION

UW iSchool Dean’s Club Dinner.
Photo © UW iSchool

Hello, I’m Jonathon Colman, a graduate student in the MSIM mid-career program.
When I’m not at the iSchool, you can find me at REI headquarters down in Kent,
where I serve as their Principal Experience Architect. And when I’m not in Kent,
you can find me stuck in traffic on I-5 because I’m trying to get back up to the
iSchool.

Now for those of you on Twitter, I’m @jcolman. I mention this because I’m
sending out pre-scheduled tweets during the evening with links that are relevant
to the subjects of our talks. You can also find them using the hashtag
#DeansClub. There’s even a pre-scheduled tweet about pre-scheduled tweets… how
meta!

Oh, yeah — and that’s a Thing now: pre-scheduled tweets. They’re perfect for
that awkward moment when you just can’t seem to find the time necessary to write
140 characters about what you’re having for dinner… but still need everyone to
know that you’re eating something.

> …against all odds, all sense of scope, and against all our rational instincts,
> we love information.

But my point — and I do have one — is that information endures. Yes, even
information on Twitter, as ephemeral as it may seem. We can still tell a story
with just 140 characters. Certainly information’s been an enduring factor in my
own life (and yours, too, I’d wager) and in a way, that endurance is what brings
us together tonight. Continue reading →

Posted in Life, Work | Tagged improv, information, introversion, introvert,
introverted, ischool, public speaking, school, shyness, stories, story, tagfee,
university of washington | 4 Comments


IGNITE SEATTLE VIDEO: HOW INTROVERTS CAN SURVIVE IN THIS EXTROVERTED WORLD

by Jonathon Colman Posted on March 25, 2013

Last month I had the honor of speaking at Ignite Seattle. My topic was How
Introverts Can Survive in This Extroverted World. Shauna Causey and Monica
Guzman encouraged me to pitch Ignite and Beth Buelow inspired me by expanding my
understanding of introversion in our recent interview.



The great folks at Ignite Seattle just released this video of my talk:



Continue reading →

Posted in Life | Tagged ignite, ignite seattle, introversion, introvert,
introverted, public speaking, video | 5 Comments
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 * ABOUT ME
   
   
   I’m a senior design manager at HubSpot, where I lead the global content
   design discipline.
   
   I’m also a pay equity advisor, Webby Award winner, keynote speaker, and
   former Peace Corps Volunteer.
   
   I've built and led design teams at Intercom, Facebook, IBM, REI, and The
   Nature Conservancy.
   
   I'm on Twitter @jcolman and you can see my links here.


 * CATEGORIES
   
   * Guest Post
   * Life
   * Love
   * Work


 * RSS
   
   * Help Marcia walk again
   * Wicked Ambiguity and User Experience
   * Why You Should Go to Confab
   * Secret Wars
   * How to Get One Million Views on SlideShare


 * SPEAKING
   
   See my presentations and videos of me speaking


 * CONTACT ME
   
   Want to talk UX? I’d love to hear from you! Contact me directly or reach out
   to me on Twitter @jcolman.
   
   Want a faster reply? Try telling me a joke—that earns you bonus points.


 * LATEST WRITING
   
    * What we look for in content design portfolios
    * What we owe each other
    * 36% of your mobile app design is text
    * We need to talk about crying at work


 * DESIGN KEYNOTES
   
    * Transparent recruiting
    * How to maximize the impact of content design
    * What do we owe to each other?
    * Wicked ambiguity and UX


 * RECENT MEDIA
   
    * Interview: Leading with Jonathon Colman
    * Interview: Content design and building teams
    * Podcast: Maximizing the Impact of Content Design

Jonathon Colman | www.jonathoncolman.org
Copyright © Jonathon Colman 2012-2024. All Rights Reserved. Contact me if you
have questions about content or licensing.