Media: Boxes and Arrows discusses the Consultant's Role

In Boxes and Arrows' column: '(Over)simple Answers for Simple Minds', George Olsen rehearses many of the same issues that appeared at the Designing Interactive Systems conference last month about the role of the consultant (see DIS2002: Conference Panel reviews the State of the Art).

It is not acceptable to admit ignorance, but it is not plausible to assume total confidence in advising clients - we don't have all the answers and the technology is changing rapidly. How then do you toe the narrow line in marketing yourself between ridiculous but crowd pleasing certainty and a more realistic but less sensational 'it depends'? And what do you do with novices, who don't even have good hunches to fall back on?

Olsen wrote me a long and thoughtful response to my own pondering on Nielsen's fortunes (see Ann's Rant: Stop, or Dr Nielsen gets it! - the Backlash in Usability? and it is good to see the debate on certainty, authority and the consultant's role continuing through contributions on the Boxes and Arrows site, led by this piece.

Associated Link: Boxes and Arrows: (Over)simple Answers for Simple Minds

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