HR and Onsite Searching

Suppose you have located what seems to be a good human resource website. The next problem is finding the information you want. The webmaster (person who put the site together) will probably have a clear idea of what should go where - but this might not be a structure that you can relate to.

For example, where is an article about cross-functional teams working on new HR systems likely to be placed? Under 'teams', 'organization', 'systems' or 'knowledge management'? Pick one - the chances are that other people will select a different choice from yours.

Then the expert versus novice problem comes into play. Have you ever tried to get a piece of electrical equipment (e.g. video recorder) or an unfamiliar software package to work USING THE MANUAL PROVIDED?

More often than not, the manual is difficult - if not impossible - to follow. Why? Because the person who wrote it knows too much and has forgotten what it is like to be a beginner. What may be obvious to the expert can be unrecognized by the novice. The manual probably does not follow a structure that would be meaningful to a beginner. And there may be too little attention given to explaining the basics simply - as opposed to providing excessive detail on all the whizzbang features that only advanced users would try.

OK. We'll go back to our team article example. The HR systems team may have been working on their project as part of the organization's Knowledge Management strategy. So the article is listed under Knowledge Management. But if you are relatively new to HR it is likely that you have never heard of Knowledge Management and this is the last place where you would go looking for an article about teams.

The more unfamiliar you are with the topic - the less likely you are to find the information you need.

How can you - or the average webmaster - overcome this problem?

In this series

Introduction

Down to basics

Website addresses

Page addresses

Link lists

HR and onsite searching

Website organization