When everyone can understand: how to design for experts and novices

Have you ever tried to find information and answers in documents intended for experts and spent hours trying to decipher it? Have you ever shown someone a diagram and seen them draw a complete blank of something you understand perfectly?

When dealing with information, the experts – people who are knowledgeable and experienced in a specific field – easily see the essence and pick out the most important parts. Novices lack this well-organized, detailed information and get overload their brains looking through everything. The result is trouble: misunderstandings, mistakes and delays.

In this talk, Sarah will take us through the key problems we face when designing information that both experts and novices will use. You'll learn how you can present your information in layers to reach the different groups, format long reports for better understanding and vary how your content is presented so that more people will be able to use it.

About Sarah Rosenbaum

Sarah studied photography at RISD in Rhode Island and graphic design training at SHKS (now KHiO) in Oslo. Her earlier work spans a broad range of visual design, including illustration, book design, corporate identity, information and digital design. She was a co-designer of the visual identity program for the 1994 Winter Olympics at Lillehammer, creating the now-iconic sports pictograms for the games and has chaired the jury of Merket for God Design, the Norwegian Design Council's award for excellence in design.

Sarah was a founding partner of the design firms Bergsnov, Mellbye and Rosenbaum and Making Waves before taking her current position combining design and research at the Norwegian Knowledge Centre for the Health Services in 2004. In 2010 she completed her Ph.D., entitled Improving the user experience of evidence. A design approach to evidence-informed health care, at at AHO in 2010