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The knowledge and experience of individuals
adds value to a business and enables a
competitive advantage. Members in one part of
an organisation have knowledge that may be
useful to someone in another part. Sharing this
knowledge and making it easily accessible to
those who need it is the key to successful
knowledge management.
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Information is data that has been processed in such a way
that it becomes useful for the end user. Within quality
management, information is used for many purposes. It is
used to monitor progress and determine where problems
exist.
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Raw Data
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Information
Data processing
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Information is any data that has been processed for a
specific purpose.
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‘Information management’ is an umbrella term
that encompasses all the systems and processes
within an organisation for the creation and use of
corporate information.
In terms of technology, information management
encompasses systems such as:
web content management (CM)
document management (DM)
records management (RM)
digital asset management (DAM)
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learning management systems (LM)
learning content management systems (LCM)
collaboration
enterprise search
and many more…
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Information management is, however, much
more than just technology. Equally
importantly, it is about the business processes
and practices that underpin the creation and
use of information.
It is also about the information itself, including
the structure of information (‘information
architecture’), metadata, content quality, and
more.
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Information management therefore
encompasses:
people
process
technology
content
Each of these must be addressed if information
management projects are to succeed.
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Organisations are confronted with many information
management problems and issues. In many ways, the
growth of electronic information (rather than paper) has
only worsened these issues over the last decade or two.
Common information management problems include:
Large number of disparate information management
systems.
Little integration or coordination between information
systems.
Range of legacy systems requiring upgrading or
replacement.
Direct competition between information management
systems.
No clear strategic direction for the overall technology
environment.
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Limited and patchy adoption of existing
information systems by staff.
Poor quality of information, including lack of
consistency, duplication, and out-of-date
information.
Little recognition and support of information
management by senior management.
Limited resources for deploying, managing or
improving information systems.
Lack of enterprise-wide definitions for information
types and values (no corporate-wide taxonomy).
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Large number of diverse business needs and
issues to be addressed.
Lack of clarity around broader organisational
strategies and directions.
Difficulties in changing working practices and
processes of staff.
Internal politics impacting on the ability to
coordinate activities enterprise-wide.
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While this can be an overwhelming list, there
are practical ways of delivering solutions that
work within these limitations and issues.
Ten principles Ten key principles to ensure
that information management activities are
effective and successful:
recognise (and manage) complexity
focus on adoption
deliver tangible & visible benefits
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prioritise according to business needs
take a journey of a thousand steps
provide strong leadership
mitigate risks
communicate extensively
aim to deliver a seamless user experience
choose the first project very carefully
With regard to the process of information gathering,
as the saying goes, it is often difficult to see the forest
for the trees. This is especially true of managing
information for large projects like writing business
plans and resource proposals. There is so much
information available in the average workplace that
often you are unable to zero in on an important
concept simply because you cannot get the right
information that you need to make a decision
effectively. An effective information management
system however can allow you to sift through the
information you have and attempt to find that
information which is most relevant to your specific
project.
When writing strategies for information
gathering, we begin by examining the information
needs of the end user. That is, we want to know
the purpose of the information gathering
activities. Why are we gathering this information?
By examining the priorities of the end user, and
what they require from the information provided
to them, you should be able to determine the most
appropriate information to provide them with –
and develop strategies that will enable your
systems to do this.
A very effective way to begin your examination of
information gathering needs is to examine the
purpose for which the end user requires the given
information. By attempting to ascertain the
information purpose, you will be able to
determine the type of information that you
should provide. If the information is needed to
make a decision related to a quality initiative,
what will be required are the pros and cons of the
various initiatives
However if the end user will just be reporting the
information (perhaps in the form of a business
plan) they will simply require the facts. Therefore
the purpose that the end user requires
information for will affect the nature of the
information that you are required to present to
them. When considering the information’s
purpose it is important to ensure that the purpose
meets with the objectives of your organisation, the
requirements set out by the organisation and the
organisation’s capabilities.
It is likely that for any information gathering
strategy, you will be provided with a brief by
your managers. This brief will outline exactly
what it is that your managers want you to achieve
- these are the requirements set out by your
organisation. All information that you gather
needs to be aligned to the specific requirements of
your organisation. Some of the requirements that
you should ensure that your information meets
include:
The scope of the information will also affect the
information. Is information only required for your
organisation, or is information required for your
organisation as well as averages for the entire
industry? Just one year or for multiple years? As
you can imagine, the greater the scope that is
required, the more work will need to be done to
obtain all the required information. Determining
the scope of the required information will enable
you to determine the amount of data you will
need to obtain and the amount of processing that
is likely to be required.
Both data and information comes in many forms.
To be able to make an effective decision, that
information needs to be in the most suitable form
for the decision maker. This means that in the
early stage you should attempt to determine the
most suitable form for this information to take.
Should you provide written information, present
the information orally to the decision maker, or
should you use visual aids, charts and graphs?
These many and varied types of information each
have their own relative advantages and
disadvantages.
The end presentation format of the data also
needs to be strongly considered. Should the data
be a report, a chart, or a speech? What level of
presentation does your organisation require of
you? Will this information need to be provided in
draft form, or in a final, finished and polished
report?
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Resources available are a significant matter when
looking at information processing strategies. With
unlimited resources, you would be able to collect
all the information you could possibly imagine,
and this could be used to make the most effective
decision possible. However in the real world there
are limits to what we can do. Budgets, time, and
expertise constrain our ability to gather the best
information. Therefore the strategies that you
develop must take the limited resources you have
into account.
Having fewer resources means you need to be
much more careful with how you approach the
problem.
Whether we like it or not, the finance department
and supervisors and managers will play an
important role in our ability to utilise the right
information strategies. Before you begin the
process of developing such a strategy, it is
important to determine the amount of money that
you are able to spend on the project. This will
affect spending in terms of your time, the types of
information you gather, and expertise you are
able to bring in. Let’s look at the three major
resource constraints that may be placed on us by
budgets.
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We mentioned scope previously. Essentially scope
is how wide your information will be. Will it only
cover a single facet of the topic, or will you attempt
to cover a much broader range. While the initial
proposal you are given will state the scope of the
study that is desired, the actual budget that you
are provided may dictate whether this scope
Is feasible or not. If the budget provided is not
high enough, you may find that you cannot
conduct the data collection and information
processing as widely as you would have hoped
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Time is money in business, and your provided
budget will have a significant effect on the time
you can put into a given project. The wider the
project is the more primary resource sources
you use, the more time it is going to take. The
time that you can put into the project will be
affected by the money that you receive to do it.
If only a small amount of money is received,
you will not be able to spend as long on the
project as you could if a large amount of
money is received.
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Expertise is likely to be related to the effects of
budget. Essentially the less money you have,
the fewer experts you are able to employ. For
example you may not be able to hire
consultants to help you put together and run a
survey program if you do not have enough
money, so you may be forced to conduct the
program yourself. You may not have the
expertise to run this program as well as a
market research house, and so the information
provided may not be accurate as could be
done.
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One method of attempting to ascertain whether
the expenditure is justified is through the use
of cost benefit analysis. For a particular project
to be seen as being useful, the benefits of
gathering the information must outweigh the
costs associated with gathering it. You will find
that for the most part, this will always be true.
Your costs associated with gathering the
required information will be low, as most
quality information will be easily found.