We believe that although tables and lists can fulfill many functions that narrative cannot, the reverse applies even more. We help organizations manage that information. And one of the tools we use is narrative , a mode of association, a way to put things together. In our writing and teaching, we help our users create a deep understanding of the complex relationships that exist in information . Certainly, no audience is a blank slate.
Students come to our classes and readers come to our documents equipped with stories of their own.
To be effective, our stories need to complement, suppress, or supplant current stories. We incorporate stories into our design processes In our research, we have spoken with organizations who watch, listen, and interact with the people they serve and build their designs, processes, and theories to meet real-life needs and problems. Not surprisingly, organizations who place users at the center of their design processes tell stories about specific people doing specific things . On the other hand, organizations whose processes are less user-centered tend to talk about products and processes and can rarely describe the results of their work in terms of specific people's lives and activities. To find out more about how Info.