# Episode 3: Finding a place for content design
Sarah Winters: Hi everyone. Welcome to the Global Content Design Podcast. Today we're talking to Ghada Kandil. She is the founder and CEO of her own content strategy and content design consultancy in Egypt. She's also the co-regional director of the World Information Architecture Association for the Middle East and Africa.
Today we're talking about inclusivity, accessibility, and content design in general.
[Intro music]
Sarah: Hi Ghada. Thank you for joining the podcast. First of all, can you tell me where you are in the world?
Ghada Kandil: I'm living in Cairo, Egypt.
Sarah: Okay. So tell us a little bit about you and your role – how did you get to where you are now?
Ghada: We are in the 90s, 1993-94. Vodafone just entered the Egyptian market, and I was doing the 'push' news as a managing editor.
And I'm very much interested in editing and doing editorial work. It's not only about writing. It's about the planning and the architecture, especially for the digital applications and how you coordinate with the people, the product manager or the manager at this time and the technical people, developers and so on.
I got very much interested in this. And then I went on with a project with the UNDP, United Nations Development Programme, and the Ministry of Information and Communication Technology here in Egypt. We did a lot of projects. One of them was the Community Development Portal, where we started, and I was very adamant that we start with user needs.
Sarah: Ah ha!
[Both laughing]
So, hold on, let's stop a second, when is this?
Ghada: That was 2001.
Sarah: 2001. And how big was that, user needs? Did you have a bank of them?
Ghada: Uh, we had let's say in each governorate, we had 4 focus groups, each group was 5 to 6 people.
Sarah: Yeah.
Ghada: For example, farmers.
What do they want? We started a database for plants, and with photos, not with words, where they can scan the leaves with the disease on it and search this on the FAO database and connect them and know what type of pesticides and medicines that they can use for their plants.
It was a huge project, actually, one of the biggest projects that I've worked on.
It took a couple of years for preparation and doing coordination with different entities. For example, the FAO, the international modern industrialization entity, so that we connect people who are doing crafts and want to sell their copper handiworks and the granite handiworks and so on.
Sarah: This is amazing. This sounds like a huge thing. So tell me…
Ghada: Yes!
Sarah: How – When you were going around these areas, and saying, "Yeah, we're going to work on user needs and we're going to have an IA [information architecture], and we're going to do it this way" – did you get a lot of people saying, "No, no, no. Just publish whatever." Or was everyone kind of like, "Yes, this is the sort of thing that we need to do."
Ghada: Definitely, I have been fighting and I'm still fighting here. If you are using the terminologies of content design and content strategy, you come with a neutral, "What are you talking about?" But you have to explain! Don't use the term, tell them, why do we need this.
And the steps to do it – with every step, there is a fight for how much are we going to spend, and why do we need this? We have developers, extremely brilliant developers, they can do the model and you just fill it with content. Come on, it's the opposite!
[Laughing]
I am going to tell the developer how to design the system and fill it with content.
Sarah: Amazing. So you've been having this fight….?
Ghada: Since 1996! When I started with the WAP application, yes!
[Laughing]
Sarah: Just fast forward to now. Where are you now? What are you doing now?
Ghada: I'm having my own small consultancy for content strategy and design. And we are handling the project management, service design, and content strategy through content strategy and content design projects.
Sarah: Amazing.
Ghada: We are working with different companies – some mobile applications, other web projects.
Sarah: And tell me, what is the state of digital at the moment in Egypt, would you say? How has it progressed?
Ghada: Actually, it's very advanced. We can say it is advanced, but not organised.
Sarah: Tell me about that.
Ghada: We have extremely, extremely talented managers and brilliant developers and technical people, but we don't have a wholesome strategy that puts everything into its own channel and makes it cohesive.
They are trying now. Actually, the Ministry of Information and Communication Technology here, they have brilliant projects right now, and they are starting for this integration and adaptation. I keep convincing them and trying to convince them that they need content strategy and content design people. Come on, there should be a department here!
But I didn't succeed yet. I succeeded with a couple of projects that I've been working on, but not as a whole strategy for the ministry.
Sarah: Well that is a massive thing! If you're going to take on the whole country, from outside, that's an amazing thing!
How would you say content is viewed then? You said you've got these amazing technical people, you've got amazing developers. Do they value content in Egypt, would you say?
Ghada: Currently yes, but still the concept of how we can collaborate and at which point should content design start is a little bit vague and not clear yet. Because usually they start designing, and developing and then, wow, we need content. Come on! But when you start with the content after you have designed and prepared your CMS you find that the content doesn't fit properly here.
Sarah: Right.
Ghada: And when you talk to them about the user need, they start returning back to the system and how it was developed.
The brilliance of the developers here, actually, and the designers also – usually they start with user needs.
They do research, they understand this, they understand the process. So, usually, yes content comes later, but they did some of the work.
But we're trying to get there.
I think it's the same thing everywhere. Yeah?
Sarah: I was just about to say, I think it is exactly the same everywhere.
How is that being received by people who are not used to this?
Ghada: People not used to this in Egypt? Or the Arabic people?
Sarah: Yeah, yeah.
Ghada: They are adapting and they are accepting it because they took to digital very easily. I have to note here that we have an illiteracy percentage, a big number of people who don't read and write, but they can use mobiles. And they can use applications.
Sarah: Is that right? Okay, so how is that being handled then, if you have low literacy but they can use those kinds of digital services?
Ghada: This is the brilliancy of the designers. I have to give it to them. The use of images and buttons that is indicative. And then if someone showed me or helped me use this application once or twice then I can use it later on, on my own. For example, I have been involved in a couple of applications for farmers. Farmers, there is a percentage who don't read and write yet. We use images.
Sarah: Amazing.
Ghada: And they can communicate.
Sarah: And do you know if anyone is blogging about this? Or openly talking about these kinds of designs and these kinds of considerations?
Ghada: I don't know. But I can find out. I'm sorry. I am being very, very lazy because I have been asked so many times to start my own blog and I'm very shy. You are the first one who convinces me to talk by the way!
Sarah: Alright, we're going to spend the rest of the podcast convincing you to blog! Because, particularly over here, everybody assumes you can read. You can just read. And if you can't read then there is some real snobbery around it. And I would be just blown away and fascinated to see what you're doing – and using those icons and the pictures and everything. Loads of organisations are trying it. But I do feel, some of the big organisations over here – the important ones – are ignoring it. And they shouldn't be!
So I want to push them towards you. So would you please blog – I'm just going to add my voice to everyone else –
[Laughter]
– who is pleading with you. Could you please start blogging about this?
It is so important to hear what other people are doing, especially in this space. And I can say in, in like 1996, it was all focus groups and we'll give people what they want, but it wasn't termed in that user needs way that I'm hearing you speak about. And I would love more. So I'm begging, please. Thank you.
Ghada: Okay.
Sarah: Now I shall stop putting you on the spot.
So in Egypt then, what is the primary challenge for content, as an industry?
Ghada: Convincing more people, especially those who are responsible for web projects and products, to have content people from the beginning.
Sarah: Right. Yeah.
Ghada: Not only as copywriters, or even UX writers, so you do on Figma the designs and come the UX writer: "just put on the words." This is not my job. I'm not good with this. I'm good with the previous steps that you skipped!
Sarah: This is exactly it, right? Some people do feel that designers and content people working together is because they're giving us wireframes or whatever, Figma files, whatever, instead of just a content management system and that's not it. We start off so much further back.
Ghada: The other thing that I think from my contact with different content designers: they all started doing – knowing – about project management. So, actually, content design and content strategists in particular can be excellent, especially those with the IA skills.
There was a group of product managers doing a small kit for junior product managers and all of them, they are using information architecture. And they are all starting to think about how to organise and use information architecture in product management. So I think those content designers with IA skills can be great.
Sarah: Yeah, I agree. I would love to see more in delivery management and product management roles. Do you think, because I was reading something just this morning about information architecture and how it seems to be a lost skill. Do you think that?
Ghada: Names are changing, but the skills are not.
I can call myself a content strategist, and since I am a volunteer at World Information Architecture Organisation, and co-regional director for the association here in the Middle East, skills are the same, but again, are we hiring someone for information architecture only?
No.
But you can gain the skills of IA and be the product manager. Or you can be the content designer. You can be the, of course, product designers, and the people are using IA. So it is not a lost skill.
Sarah: Yeah.
Ghada: It's again an essential skill. The name is fading off because again, we are not hiring only an information architect and then a UX manager.
Because UX people are using information architecture skills. For myself, I think the word and the term is very important to stay alive. But people are using more UX, but there is no actual UX or UX research without information architecture at its base, at its core.
Sarah: Yeah. Do you think that we might get to a point where we expect 1 person to do too much?
Ghada: Yes. Because everyone wants 1 person, paying 1 person doing everything.
Sarah: Yeah, that's it. And very cheaply, please!
[Laughter]
It's interesting because there's – in the digital sphere, it would be great if there were a lot of people who understood content, right? And had a better understanding. I think it would be better if they had a deeper understanding of exactly what content people go through to produce really good content.
Doesn't mean to say that they have to do it, but they do need to understand it.
Ghada: That's why I would love more content designers to get to know about information architecture and to gain such skills. And if they can start organising their own groups in their own countries about information architecture. Listening to people. Come and visit worldiaday.org website.
There is a huge content collection from the previous years of talking about information architecture. And, we are doing the new version of the website. I think it would be very interesting for content designers. And World IA Cafes conducted by Rupa Misra in the States. Usually very interesting topics about taxonomy, about information architecture, about how you are using the content.
Sarah: Yeah, yeah, and for those listening to the podcast, we will link to all of this on the website page.
Okay. So, can you think of any words or phrases or expressions that work really well in Egypt, but they wouldn't work well anywhere else?
Ghada: It is not, not working well as, it has to be explained, if I'm telling people, uh, 'movement is blessing'.
Sarah: Okay.
Ghada: In Arabic, 'al haraka baraka'.
It's something here that is encouraging you to work and to contact with people and to do. The movement, the verb…
Sarah: Yeah?
Ghada: It's a grace, it's a blessing, and it always opens doors.
It gets you to know more people. It is a little bit difficult for the non-Egyptian or non-Arab to understand. You have to explain it to them.
There are a lot of idioms here in Egypt and in the Arab world. Just tiny phrases, but they are very much well understood and commonly used among people.
Sarah: Okay. What's your favourite then?
Ghada: Mine?
Sarah: Yeah!
Ghada: I like the one I gave you, 'al haraka baraka'. And there is 1 comic one – it is called the bald lady. If the bald lady can't have it, so does the lady with hair.
[Laughing]
Sarah: Okay, what does that mean?
Ghada: So, it's how much something is valuable or weighs. If you don't have hair, if you are bald, nothing much will make sense if you want to comb your hair or to apply something. It's bald. There is nothing. And it's always futile also if you have hair. Both – the value is none.
Sarah: Do you know what, I love that one! I may have to start using that one because it's so perfect for digital, isn't it? It's kind of people, you know, 'oh, my audience is everybody all the time.' And it's like, 'no, it's not!'
[Laughter]
It never is. Because for example, if you're bald, you're not going to need a hairbrush, are you?
Yes. All right. Well, thank you very much. May I steal that one and use that?
Ghada: Sure. It's not mine!
Sarah: Brilliant. Okay. So what have we not talked about? In terms of content, in terms of digital, in terms of your country or the industry in general, what have we not talked about that we should have?
Ghada: What about the abbreviation EMEA? Europe, Middle East and Africa. Which is always next to jobs that is this time zone. This area…
Sarah: Yeah.
Ghada: And usually they are not accepting anyone from Africa.
Sarah: Hold on a minute!
Ghada: It's Europe, Middle East, Africa, and if this job is in Europe, for example, and almost the same time zone, you are not accepted because you are in the Middle East. Or actually, an Arab country, because they are worried about your language, your English, and maybe they are – I don't know why. I would love to ask people, why do you mention EMEA next to all the jobs, stating the time zone, and when an Egyptian applies, it's not accepted?
Sarah: All right. Well, anybody listening who has an answer to that, you need to get in touch because yeah, I don't know. We'll ask the community.
Ghada: And of course during the COVID time, when everyone was chained to their laptops at home, I cannot thank enough those who opened their conferences online for people who cannot afford to pay for it.
I would love, on behalf of myself and all my content people and friends in the Arab countries, if this is a country that is of extreme currency, please have another rate for extreme currencies.
Indi Young, on her website, for the listening courses and the mental model courses, she has extreme currency rates.
That's very, very thoughtful.
Sarah: Do you have a lot of meetups and conferences in Egypt? Is it a big thing over there?
Ghada: There are a lot of start-up meet ups and specialised meetups like product management and product designing. Usually I try to attend and explain content design and how we can integrate it within these places.
Conferences? There are always conferences for start-ups and venture capitals and the people who are pitching, but they have booths for product design and talks about product design, product management. And we are fighting to have our own content strategy and design talk in these conferences.
Sarah: It just sounds like you're a one woman fight over there. Is there a big community?
Ghada: No, no, no, no, no. There is another company that is providing also UX writing and content design courses. Actually, they started 4 years ago or 5 years ago, and they are very active providing UX writing courses and advanced and beginner levels.
I'm not the only one fighting. There are others!
[Laughter]
Sarah: You were talking about remote and you were talking about COVID. Now here, a lot of things went online and now it's all going back to in person. Is that the same over there?
Ghada: Yes.
Sarah: And, and how is that? Because again here a lot of people who could not travel for work or, you know, they have access needs, were actually finding that they can find work far more easily in COVID than they can outside of it. Again, what's it like over there?
Ghada: This is the same situation here and we are resisting going back to work 5 days a week so most of it is hybrid, 2 or 3 days going to offices and having a couple of days at home. But still people here are very resourceful and they are trying to work as hybrid.
Those who are working at international companies and abroad companies, developers mostly, and designers are working from home or from anywhere they want, and everything is online and it's working.
Sarah: Amazing. Amazing. Okay, you've done so much work for so long. Can I please ask you to talk more? There's so much that we can learn from you. There's so much that I could have done with, please, thank you, in the 90s! When I was hugely struggling in the British government going "just help me!"
Ghada: It's so long because I'm older!
Sarah: Aren't we all!
[Laughter]
Thank you very much for coming on and I hope we hear so much more from you very very soon.
Ghada: You're most welcome. Thank you for having me.