Despite the temptation to dive into designing screens for a new web site, good designers know that a more deliberate, considered approach leads to better design. The more complex the system, the truer this is. Designers working on elaborate business applications have to deal with dozens of features, scenarios and business rules. A little planning goes a long way. Two diagrams essential to the planning process are flow charts and concept models. Flow charts help designers envision processes and tasks while concept models illustrate a site's underlying structure. In this workshop, participants will learn how to create their own diagrams and use them in the planning process.

About Dan Brown

Dan co-founded EightShapes, a user experience design firm based in Washington, DC. His clients include National Geographic, Cisco, WebEx, US Department of Energy, US Department of Education. Dan has written numerous articles on information architecture and design, and had a regular column in BoxesandArrows.com. In 2006, he published Communicating Design, widely considered part of the “UX canon.” Newly updated, the second edition (New Riders, 2010) expands on principles for creating create user experience documentation. Dan’s next speaking engagement is at UX Lisbon, in May 2011.