*February 10, 2009: Engagement and stakeholding. And steak.*

Yesterday morning I was lugging a suitcase homeward, still bleary from a
red-eye flight from Vancouver, where I'd attended the
interaction'09<http://interaction09.ixda.org/>conference. Although I
felt like hell, clearly I looked like a giant of
industry, or at least a man of reasonable means, as I was approached by a
fellow who asked me, "Hey, chief, want to buy some steaks?"

Raw steak. On Seventh Avenue. In the morning. Oh well, you've gotta admire
the entrepreneurial instinct, however misplaced.

But the funny thing was that I'd just been thinking about steaks. Well, to
be honest, stakes, as in stakeholding. At the conference, I'd been
explaining the Rosenfeld Media <http://rosenfeldmedia.com/> publishing model
to a dozen or so prospective authors. I kept returning to the words
"engagement" and "stakeholding". I explained that one of our major goals is
to engage with all sorts of people—practitioners, influencers, subject
matter experts, and more—so that they'd have a stake in each book. More
engagement from more stakeholders during the creation of the product leads
to a better product.

That our goal, but isn't it yours too?

Whatever type of work we're doing, and whatever terms we use to describe it,
when it comes to our hoped-for outcomes, aren't we all trying to get beyond
experience, interaction, and design? Aren't we trying to create artifacts
that ultimately engage? Isn't that the secret sauce?

For example, at the conference, I was talking with a couple of the
interaction design field's strongest advocates. I think they're doing
wonderful things, and the conference was fantastic. But the term
interaction: well, interactions happen, one way or another. And they can be
good, or not so good. But it's a dry term, almost too objective.

But engagement seems to have a much higher degree of implicit value. People
don't typically engage with things the don't like. When they engage, they've
acquired a sense of stake in whatever they're using, and there's a true
dialogue between user and system and the people behind the system.
Engagement means blurring the lines between user and provider, as the
implicit dialogue leads to all players enjoying a stake in a shared system
(or experience).

Thinking in terms of engagement, rather than experience, architecture, or
interactions, has opened all sorts of doors for me, whether I'm consulting,
publishing, or whatever. I look at every potential relationship between
people involved in an experience, and ask "How we engage better?" and "How
can they have a stake in what we're doing?" To me, that's much richer than
asking how we can help users interact better, or help them find better, or
entertain them better, or anything else.

So please pardon me if, during our next conversation, I keep repeating the
terms "engagement" and "stakeholding". It just feels right. Moreso than any
other term, even "user experience".

What do you think?


PS To all you vegetarians out there, please pardon the red meat reference;
it's just difficult not to share some of the odd occurrences that happen
along Brooklyn's Seventh Avenue.


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