AJ: How many different published sources are you currently in right now? What are some notable ones?
WN: To be honest, I have no idea who is publishing White Ninja. Perhaps this isn’t the best business move. But, neither Scott nor I have any clue how to run a successful business.

You see, we post a link to the latest comic that is free and open to whoever wants to publish White Ninja. I know that there are independent and college newspapers in Singapore, New Zealand, Australia, the UK, Canada and the USA that are using the link. We also have two published books out that are available at your local bookstore for your reading and purchasing pleasure. And, White Ninja has been affiliated with National Lampoon, Cracked.com, Virgin Airways, and Crave Online.

AJ: Does that blow your mind?
WN: No way. White Ninja is the greatest comic ever written about a White Ninja, ever!

AJ: What’s the weirdest fan mail or suggestion you’ve received? Any good haters out there?
WN: By far the weirdest email we received was a marriage proposal. This girl – this incredibly attractive girl, I suspect – wanted to marry White Ninja and have his babies. It was difficult to break the news to her that White Ninja is not a real person. She must have understood because days later she proposed to both Scott and I.

The second weirdest was simply a photo of a girl wearing a White Ninja t-shirt. The shirt, accidentally, was on a little crooked, and a single naked bosom was showing from underneath. Whoops!

AJ: Walk us through the process of how you guys produce one strip, from idea to execution.
WN: It all starts with a good night’s sleep. Before bed I drink two cups of lavender tea with whole milk. Scott has a warm bath with a glass of red wine. We wake up feeling refreshed and ready to work.

So we each go to work. Me, to my private clinic to do some physical therapy, and Scott to a school to teach children how to learn. When work is over, we’re usually too tired to draw cartoons, and we definitely don’t feel funny, so we put off writing comics until the weekend.

Saturday arrives. At noon or so, when we’ve awoken, we’ll get together over a pot of coffee and stare at blank pieces of paper until an idea strikes us in the brain. Sometimes a half hour will go by with nothing being drawn, written, or even said. And then another half hour. After an hour and a half we’ll pack up our stuff and head to the pub for a “business lunch.”

Magically, by the end of the day, we have somewhere between two and eight comics completed.

AJ: How long have you been doing this? What are your future plans for WN?
WN: We’ve been drawing the comic for fourteen or fifteen years! Holy bananas! That makes White Ninja fifteen years old! Unlike The Simpsons, White Ninja actually gets older with each passing year. When we started, White Ninja was zero years old. We stopped counting his birthday after the first couple years though. All along we said we would stop on the Christmas Eve of White Ninja’s 48th year. In this final comic, White Ninja will die on the streets from exposure. It will not be funny. It will make people re-think the whole White Ninja saga. They’ll ponder, “Was it ever a joke?” “Was there underlying societal commentaries that I’ve been missing?” Bahahahaha! So I guess we won’t be able to retire for 33 years.

AJ: Explain to me how you guys have managed to make money on this?
WN: Well, putting a comic on the Internet, for free, and giving it away to newspapers all over the world, for free, makes us roughly $0.00 a week. Times that by four, and then again by twelve… basically, we make nothing.

BUT, we’ve discovered that people like to wear clothes. Especially clothes which have pictures of animals killing each other on them. Seriously. So what we’ve done is, we’ve used the popularity of whiteninjacomics.com to link to another website that we made where you can buy t-shirts with some seriously dynamic wildlife happening on them. We design all the shirts. Some features Pterodactyls fighting with lazer-beam-eyes…in outer space! And Owls, madly chomping away on a piece of delicious taffy. Heck yeah! And Tigers firing automatic weapons! It has nothing to do with the comic, but we couldn’t sell dumb shirts if we didn’t have the comic first. The website is casasupernova.com, in case you’re interested.

AJ: Is this self sustaining? (i.e. are you working at Starbucks?)
WN: Starbucks?! Just because we draw comics for a living doesn’t mean we don’t have any other skills. For all you know I could be a brain doctor! This interview is over!

But to answer your question, we make barely enough to live on. That is, if we wanted to live on Saskatoon’s dangerous west side. No thanks! Seriously though, I enjoy having a couch, and a box-spring under my mattress, and a variety of cups to drink out of, and all those other novelties enjoyed by the upper-middle class. And for that, we have other jobs.

AJ: What do you have to say to the people who say WN isn’t funny?
WN: “It is too, funny!” Yeah, usually we say that.

AJ: I’ve tried to draw WN before, and I’m horrbile. Any tips for me?
WN: Trace your ‘F’ finger, and then add arms and legs. For the eyes you will need two dots. Practice these on a separate piece of paper first.

Join us for this live webcast

Date: Tuesday March 16, 2010

Time: 11:00pm PT, 12:00pm MT, 1:00pm CT, 2:00pm ET

Cost: Complimentary

Register

Join Stephanie and David live as they walk you through basic strategies for how you can enhance your school’s online presence. Learn from current university, college and institution examples, showcasing some of the best websites, online initiatives, and social media tool use. Stephanie and David will highlight how you can develop interactive experiences to fully engage your stakeholders.

• Explore opportunities to reach your main audiences, including students, alumni, and potential staff.
• Examine simple social media tools that schools can use to more widely distribute their message.
• Review steps to take your interactive strategy towards the ultimate goal of creating an engaged, sustainable community, both on and off line.

Stephanie Hughes is an Account Executive at zu and has worked with a variety of educational institutions, including SIAST and SIIT (Saskatchewan Indian Institute of Technology). Serving individual departments, entire school divisions, and specialized training centres has granted her well-rounded insight into the realm of schools. When combined with her knowledge of web trends, the newest interactive tools, and her own BBA and MBA experience, Stephanie will share a unique expertise with viewers.

David Francis is the Academic Director for SIAST’s Virtual Campus and has 15 years of experience in leading online learning initiatives. SIAST’s Virtual Campus is the institution’s centre of excellence for online course development and delivery, as well as website oversight, faculty training and print-distance materials. David will share his experiences in managing stakeholder expectations while delivering high quality initiatives for SIAST’s web properties and online training materials.

Before I get further into this story, I want to get you in the mood for what I’m going to do next. To do that, I’m going to ask you to watch the video below. I hope you’re strong enough to muscle through at least half of it.

Ok, ready?

It looks like Internet Explorer 6 – *puts on sunglasses* – has been rendered obsolete.

Wow. I really can’t believe I just wrote that. Or that I spent half an hour trying to think of a good line and that’s all I came up with.

But yes, the bell has tolled for Internet Explorer 6. As of March 1, 2010, Google has officially started phasing out support for Internet Explorer 6. A statement like that is enough for web developers to rejoice and start singing songs. If you don’t believe me, check out this video.

I won’t break down all of the reasons that led to Google making this move but I will be so bold as to sum it up with one word: security. If you wish to know more details, you should read their excellent blog post regarding their decision.

Now that you know what Google is doing, I bet you want to know what zu is doing!

At zu, we have a two-tier browser support system. We build sites so they look and function identically in any Tier 1 browser. With Tier 2 browsers, we have a level of “acceptable losses” in terms of display and functionality discrepancies.

Our definition of “acceptable losses” is the following: “any discovered bugs that affect the usability of the website should be fixed.”

This means that if we notice extra spacing between the top navigation and content, we won’t spend time debugging and fixing that issue in Tier 2 browsers. If the top navigation doesn’t show up in Tier 2 browsers, we would spend time to correct that issue.

Internet Explorer 6 has been a Tier 1 browser dating back to before we introduced our tiered system. I’m happy to announce that as of March 1, 2010, Internet Explorer 6 is officially a Tier 2 browser at zu.

Some may wonder why we haven’t simply dropped support altogether for IE6 as Google has done. I’ll sum that up in one word: 20%. That’s the estimated market share of IE6 as of February 2010. And while we want our developers to not be restricted by a decade-old relic of a browser, we also want to ensure our client’s sites are as widely viewable as possible.

There will be funeral services today and while we won’t be attending, we will be wearing our best mourning attire. I’m guessing there won’t be too somber of an atmosphere though. In fact, it’s likely to be one of the most jubilant funerals ever!

I loved that TV. I remember many a night falling asleep by its glowing light. I even recall falling asleep with it on after watching The Ring. I woke up in the middle of the night to sheer darkness broken only by a hissing, static-filled screen. I’m not too proud to say I turned on a lot of lights, shut the TV off, grabbed a hockey stick – because hockey sticks are the best defense against ghosts – and huddled in a corner until dawn.

But though I loved my TV, the pull of big screen HD sets was getting stronger. The technology had gone beyond the realm of early adopters and was starting to firmly entrench itself not as a luxury item, but simply as a consumer staple in a privileged country.

For months, I would spend hours walking through our local tech stores analyzing prices and features and marveling at just how stunning sports and nature shows were in HD. This went on for so long that one day Albert had heard enough. He said, “I know you don’t like impulse buys. I know this. But we’re gonna get you a new TV today.”

We headed out to a store which shall remain nameless and I was just about to finalize the deal when I got annoyed by the salesman and called it off. I told myself it was a sign from the universe and resolved to use my weathered old friend until it gave up the ghost. Three days later, the picture tube blew. I now watch all my sports on a 50” HD screen.

It would appear I got in right before the trend hit critical mass. In fact, one could argue that the trend hit critical mass right after I got in.*

Now, I told you that story to tell you this one.

When I first met Katherine about three years ago, she was the proud owner of a Motorola Razr. At the time, it was the talk of the tech world. Slim, light, strong and sexy, it hit on all the right buttons.

But though she loved her phone, the pull of smartphones was getting stronger. The technology had gone beyond the realm of early adopters and was starting to firmly entrench itself not as a luxury item, but simply as a consumer staple.

A couple weeks ago, she and I were discussing mobile devices and the unique challenges they present for websites and, once again, I tried to slyly convince her to get a smartphone. She was nearly over the fence but just couldn’t get past the fact that her current phone worked just fine.

She revealed she had nearly pulled the trigger a couple weeks ago and backed out for that very reason. She had resigned herself to fate and decided she’d use the Razr until it died. Three days later, she dropped her phone and broke it in half. She’s now the proud owner of a Blackberry Tour.

And while my involvement in this cosmic message was minimal, it will have a similar result. Smartphones are hitting critical mass and it won’t be long until they’ve gone beyond the realm of luxury item to a consumer staple, with one key difference. This won’t be a consumer staple only for privileged countries. This is a global trend that will extend farther than TV could ever hope to reach.

It’s time for a smartphone!

*One would not win that argument, but it helps tie the story together.

If you Google “twitter hacked” you will see that banks, politicians, large corporations and individuals experienced the same issues as zu did. You will also read that many of them did not know what to do and they started sending out panic tweets, which probably did more harm than the original phishing attack. It should be noted that in all cases, no follower data was accessed.

Here is what we did a few minutes after the attack. We quickly changed our password so that the phishing attacks would stop. Then we disabled the ability for third-party software, such as TweetDeck and TwitterBerry, to access our account. Finally, and this is the most important thing, we sent out a tweet acknowledging what happened, apologizing and saying we fixed it.

This let everyone know we were aware of the problem and we fixed it. What happened afterwards was a bunch of people thanking zu and supporting @zutweets.

Phishing attacks will happen to everyone at some point. It is part of being on the Internet. These are not a big deal if handled properly, so prepare yourself ahead of time.

In our second installment of videos from December’s 85th Annual Mackenzie Thayer Awards for Entertainment Excellence, we feature a silent film that was originally aired on an episode of ZNL. For those born in the 1800s when silent film was as good as it got, the film will be interpreted an emotional joy ride about life and death. However, to those of us born in the age of blockbusters and Arnold Schwarzenegger, the film may be interpreted as a piece of art.

Enjoy the flick, it is brought to you by:

Albert, Devon, Jamie, Jane, Dan, Melissa, Levi B and Ryan.

Ads: The more pages of content you are forced to cycle through, the more ads you are served. This is the reason articles are infuriatingly broken into multiple pages. Good from a business sense, perhaps, but certainly not good for user experience.

Legacy: When people still accessed the Internet with 2,400 baud modems, pages loaded so slowly it made sense to break content into easily downloaded chunks. Once it became ingrained that pagination was good usability, it somehow got lost that average Internet speeds are hundreds of times faster now. If your only reason for breaking content into numbered pages is download speed or tradition, you’re probably better off with the content on one page.

Laziness: Organizing information well can be challenging, and good information architects aren’t easy to find. Templated blogging platforms reinforce this bad usability with their architecture designed to accommodate any content while excelling at none. Far more useful than a link at the end of a post to an “older post” is a list of similar, relevant articles.

Disregard: If a website provides a service no one else does, it can survive for a time ignoring how people actually use their data. If users are trying to compare items in a list, or have the ability to resort tables based on different headings, you probably shouldn’t be paginating.

Scale: Sometimes there is just too much content to architect well, like Google search results, and the effort becomes pushing as much relevant information as possible to the first page. Though the other pages become unnecessary, they are still better ways to present this information, like loading in new content when the user scrolls to the bottom of the screen.  Cooliris is a dramatic display of how much better image searches could be without pagination.

A caveat in conclusion: test with your users.  Pagination may be greatly overused, but it still has its place, so think critically about why you’re using it and evaluate if it really is adding more than it’s detracting from the user experience.

We spent 18 months renovating a brick building located in Saskatoon’s old warehouse district. Originally built in 1929, the challenge was to bring it up to modern standards while still maintaining its original bricks, beams, ceilings and the like.

People would often ask why we put so much effort into the building’s restoration. The answer is partly because we needed more space as the company has grown substantially over the past ten years, but part of it was to contribute to the ongoing improvement of the Saskatoon community. The location suited zu because we wanted to be downtown close to our clients, close to transportation and close to amenities for staff. What we’ve brought to the downtown community is a staff who spends money in restaurants and shops, a smaller environmental imprint, an increase in property value and the transformation of an eye-sore building.

When we talk about community these days, it seems to be about social media communities. These social media communities are the new way to network, build brand recognition, increase sales and improve your company’s profile. These communities are growing faster than any form of media has in the past. You need to be using these tools to survive as a business.

As society continues to develop these electronic communities, we have increased our need to “be in touch”. Which brings me back to the Heritage Awards. zu, by moving closer to our clients and friends, has increased our participation in old school communities. You know, the communities where you meet in-person for coffee, lunch or a drink. This in-person community takes more time and effort to develop relationships than the electronic community does. But in-person communities are more rewarding both personally and professionally.

So, while you ask yourself what you should be doing with social media, make sure that you have the fundamentals of your business down. Remember that the community around you is important and will be affected by your presence and outreach. As your company moves forward, keep in mind that social media has a social aspect to it. Call up a few clients and meet them for a coffee in the neighbourhood before trying to reach them electronically.

Oh so debonair.

Now that’s pancake perfection.

The 85th Annual MacKenzie Thayer Awards for Entertainment Excellence

No peeking!

Each week, zuLife will feature a film from the awards presentation as a way of showing off our creative side and poking a bit of fun at our staff.  To begin, we have an out of this world sci-fi thriller that has it all: aliens, skeletons, ghosts, ninjas and screaming ladies.

Here is: Aliens From the Planet 303P

Actor Genie has been specifically designed for actors, but it can be a powerful tool for anyone working, or interested in the film and television industry. It’s the best way to know what’s casting, who’s casting it and where to find representation.

The app is the brainchild of Hollywood casting director Heidi Levitt, perhaps best known for her work on such films as JFK, Natural Born Killers, Nixon, The Rock, Joy Luck Club, Lakeview Terrace and numerous independent films.

As for zu, though we all considered auditioning for the new Conan movie, we’re just as happy to be on the development side of things.

For a closer look or to download it, check out the Actor Genie Website.

]]> http://www.zu.com/live/2010/02/news-events/news/new-iphoneipod-app-for-actors/feed/ 0 http://www.zu.com/live/2010/02/ideas/business/step-inside-the-cn-website-project/ http://www.zu.com/live/2010/02/ideas/business/step-inside-the-cn-website-project/#comments Wed, 03 Feb 2010 15:13:46 +0000 Michelle MacDonald http://www.zu.com/live/?p=4427 The project: providing online customer-centric service solutions for an $8B transportation company.

CN, a North American railway, brings its business closer to its customers by providing live, updated information on every operational facet of customers’ shipments. It is an evolutionary approach in websites for customers who want it all.

About CN
CN is a leader in the North American rail industry. More than just a railroad, CN is a transportation company offering integrated transportation services including rail, intermodal, trucking, freight forwarding, warehousing and distribution.

Situation Analysis
The previous site design and architecture was outdated and cluttered. There was no existing database or content management system (CMS) and all content was built and updated in HTML. A current inventory of 2,500 pages was taxing to manage so content had to be condensed to 1,500 pages while maintaining multilingual communications in four languages. The functionality of the existing online customer tools (eBusiness) also required upgrades to establish a positive customer-centric experience. The CN website was mainly used by customers to carry out tasks regarding their shipments. However, it provided a confusing architecture to find information regarding how, what and where things could be shipped.

A complete redesign, reengineering and implementation of a third party CMS (RedDot) was required.

Goals
Due to the complex nature of the inherited assets in the existing site, the CN project required initiatives to be rolled out in phases. The infrastructure, navigation, appearance and usability of the website required immediate attention. Secondary goals addressed recruiting needs, investor relations reporting, corporate information and news, and customization of relevant target marketing messages. And finally, the eBusiness site required a redesign to better integrate with the new public site design.

Challenges
The true challenge of this project laid in the need for trust and transparency between parties in order to reach a common goal.  The zu team worked diligently with CN on coordinating a seamless project. Because the content was provided by CN, and the CMS integration was done by the CMS vendor, this created a need for zu to develop a strategy that would support third party CMS integration by acting as an intermediary between the CN web team and CMS vendor. zu Systems Analysts developed functional specifications that were  complex in nature and zu Developers had to undergo extensive training in order to clearly define the third party CMS requirements. Converting 5,000 pages of content required editing and proofing resources in four languages.

Solutions
The design and information architecture solutions were developed by zu and applied to the frontend of the new site. In order to create an intuitive user experience, simple and clean design enhancements were implemented and the information architecture was rebuilt to facilitate typical customer tasks and information needs. zu provided CN with the tools to update specific real estate in the website by assisting with the configuration of the CMS. This created more autonomy for CN to craft custom messaging when required and further eliminated HTML updates that once fell on IT. Customization tools were applied to the eBusiness components in order to create a customer-centric website which would enable the CN ecommerce sales channel to better achieve financial targets. zu created a strategy that enabled marketing users to insert tailored banners to communicate key information to investors and analysts.

Solution Summary

• New site design
• New site information architecture
• Technical strategy
• Functional specifications
• Development of cascading style sheets (CSS)
• Integration and support for third party CMS (Red Dot)
• Integration of third party data feeds and components
• Functional programming
• Reintegration of web analytics
• Content editing, proofing and insertion of 1,500 pages in 4 languages
• Integration of Google Search

Result
Despite an economic downturn in 2009, CN’s public website page views increased 25% year-over-year compared to its previous website. A service-oriented site allowing visitors and customers to quickly determine how, what and where they can ship was achieved.

Where You Fit In
The CN case study is an example of what zu values in a client-business relationship. The process of evaluating needs, providing strategic advice and working together to reach collective goals is what zu does best – regardless of a project’s size. With some of the freshest minds in the game, zu will find innovative ways to take your business to new heights. Combining captivating design with effective online tools will give your organization a fresh, new appeal.

“zu’s dedication, flexibility, creativity, and expertise made our project successful.” -Paul Clarke, CN eBusiness

Avoid big committees
Outside of jury duty, I don’t know where else these are genuinely useful, but they can be devastating to a website project budget. Long meetings combined with a dominant voice with little to say make it difficult for important information to be extracted to form any sort of web strategy.  If committees can’t be avoided, try to select one point of contact that interfaces with the agency, while bringing in committees during the early discovery phase and for major presentations.

Be committed
Understand that this is a team project and you are a part of it. Don’t be surprised if managing the website project is a full time position (or more).

Trust the team you hired
If you find yourself researching solutions or micro-managing the process, it’s probably because you don’t trust the agency or team you’ve hired. Do your due diligence to find a team that you trust in order to avoid second guessing during the project. Understand that your agency should be experienced in this sort of project and they might be suggesting solutions that will help to avoid cost overruns in the future.

Client experience matters
Having someone on your end who understands web development—or has experience on a previous redesign—will keep the project closer to budget. The more you can hit the ground running, the less time is spent on explaining and training. Rarely will an agency budget an exorbitant amount for hand-holding during a project, so these costs (i.e. additional meetings) usually come at the client’s surprise.

Rushed deadlines and last minute updates
Rushing a deadline for any reason will usually result in cost overruns. Whether from premium rates or pulling new people onto the project, you will have to evaluate the marginal benefit of a quick turnaround as opposed to working out a more realistic deadline. Last minute updates should also be avoided as much as possible. Even a seemingly innocuous change can require additional documentation, programming changes, and quality assurance checks that could be avoided if known in advance.

Details, details, details
The more details at the beginning of the project—even in the discovery stage—the better. Though many project details are preconceived before picking a vendor, most agencies will agree that being part of the initial planning stages and assisting with overall strategic planning and visioning results in a stronger end result.

Be an organized client
This is a simple piece of advice, but seems to always happen. From easily overlooked protocols like inconsistent labelling of files and lazy folder structures when submitting content, to arriving late for meetings, disorganization can turn the project into a puzzle.

Focus on doing a few things right
Scope creep is inevitable, so keeping it to a minimum should be your goal. It’s common that once the ball gets rolling, the client suddenly ‘gets it’ and new features are suggested late in the game. Ask yourself, ‘is it a deal breaker if we launch without this feature?’ Understand that there is life after the launch, so don’t be afraid to plan for and release new features later on.

Save up your changes
Good things come in bunches. That holds true for changes. If you can, save up your changes or updates and send them to your agency all at once. Sending a series of changes (and changes to your changes) in a combination of phone calls, meetings and emails results in reduced efficiency, and increases the chance that something could be missed, or that one change will unexpectedly effect another.

Keep the flow
Long breaks between approvals hurt the momentum. When projects restart after dormancy, it takes a while to get everyone back to working as well-oiled as before, which generally leads to things taking longer.  Your agency team may need to reacquaint themselves with the documentation on your project, review old code or design work to get their groove back, or may even be tied up with something else if the delay was unexpectedly long.

Understand what you’re in for
This isn’t so much a tip as a mindset you need to be in when starting a web project. Developing a website is an IT-style project, following much the same workflow process.  And while the IT manager mantra of ‘it’s going to cost four times as much and take four times as long as anticipated’ might not hold true for most web projects, it’s important to understand how quickly the entire process can unravel when the client and agency don’t have a consistent vision, clear strategy, and an understanding of what causes cost overruns.

Firstly, are you looking for a product company or a service agency? There is a difference and it may help to narrow the scope of your decision.

A product company will provide you with an entry level website solution. You can indentify a product company when the organization provides you with a quote without taking the time to understand your business as a whole. For a product company, the focus is usually placed on pre-designed templates and where your logo will be placed. They will not ask for your branding guidelines or about your long term objectives, or provide you with a maintenance schedule. The designer may also be the programmer. It would be like hiring your mechanic to be the interior designer of your home. I’m not saying mechanics can’t do interior design, I’m just saying they are not as specialized if they are a jack of all trades and experts at neither.

A service agency, such as zu, will take the time to understand your business. They will take the time to collaborate with your team, review all aspects of the marketing material, online and offline, and provide you with a phased approach for long term growth. A service agency will have teams of dedicated talent to ensure your story will provide the best results based on your desired outcome. However, they are more likely to cost more and take longer than your uncle’s nephew to build a site.

Secondly, what does your budget look like?

It might also be fair to say you just need an economic solution. You might simply need ‘something’ to get going and that is fine. But remember not to refrain from thinking big as your true focus should be the size of the impact needed to see results. Don’t underestimate the value of your website and what an exceptional user experience can provide to your bottom line. Finally, don’t underestimate how long it can take to roll out a successful project. Anything worthwhile takes time and if you rush the project you will be spending more money by repeating the process sooner than you think.

Thirdly, how is your website enhancing your marketing and communications strategy?

Websites have evolved to be much more than just a logo with business hours – although some companies still forget to add them. Whether it is selling sweaters, attracting investors or competing for tourism, making your website an effective tool for communicating your story should be a number one priority.

I would like to share a story which to this day surprises me. I was having a conversation with an individual who mentioned they had spent $20M on renovations to become a world-class destination in the tourism industry. They proceeded to tell me they allotted $6K to their website. That is a 0.0003% investment online to best reflect the entire renovation project. As many as 80% of their guests will determine if they should visit this world-class destination by viewing their website. If I were the owner of that company, I would want to ensure the renovation was best reflected online to maximize results. I don’t know of any top-notch web companies that could provide a great online solution with a $6K price tag. Yikes, sounds like a missed opportunity to me.

So before you run off to phone ten companies and request proposals, ask yourself what you want from an interactive agency. Take the time to research the companies you are interested in, compare portfolios, the size of staff, how long they have been in business and the differences in services. Compare apples to apples. Those comparisons alone will be key indicators in determining which agency is the right fit for you.

One of my favourite management books, John Heider’s Tao of Leadership, describes the importance of process. Here is a partial reading:

“Do not lose sight of the single principle: how everything works. When this principle is lost and the method of meditating on process fails, the group becomes mired in intellectual discussion of what could have happened, what should have happened, what this technique or that might do. Soon the group will be quarrelsome and depressed…When a person forgets that all creation is a unity, allegiance goes to lesser wholes such as family, the home team, or the company.”

This is a good description of how the client-contractor team will tend to lose unity and become quarrelsome should it lose focus on the process by which sites are created.

This is why the process must be respected.

This was apparent to Lao Tzu in the 5^th century B.C. and still makes sense today.