In a world inundated with information, data, and content, businesses are facing a demand to implement new, adaptive strategies to mitigate their growing mass of unorganized information.
Information Overload, or stress induced by the reception of more information than is necessary to make a decision, has become an all-too common feature in our daily lives, projects and in our companies. For most of us, content floods in by way of numerous formats throughout the day, and often without structure. The result is a stacking of information that lacks context, which doesn't provide useful insights or actionable options for the information manager.
A recent article in Information Age points to this issue and argues, "For information professionals and the business leaders they support, the most critical information management skills that businesses will need over the coming years are the ability to add value to information through insight and analysis, combined with a strategic outlook and awareness of business goals."
Small versus Large Companies
Whether you work for a small business or startup or a large corporation, chances are information management is a growing issue. For smaller companies, it's important to begin building a base of data to return to and grow upon. This information should be clean enough to use ongoing but also sophisticated enough to build on as the company grows. Many small companies begin using a basic service like Google Docs and then find that their information has become too robust - leaving them with the daunting task of migrating information to a more advanced information platform.
Larger corporations typically already have a mass of data collected over the years, but if this content isn't organized in a somewhat flexible way, those who manage the information will inevitably run into daunting challenges as they try to stay current with ever-expanding information inputs and expected capabilities.
More than Problem-Mitigation
But the demand for information management solutions isn't just about meeting an overflow of content and organizing it to avoid stress or confusion. Businesses today are "relying more and more on timely, contextually relevant data to achieve return on their investments. With the increase in diverse data points, systems are being developed to move beyond business intelligence to single sources of truth," Chris Wilder explains. The premise of The Innovator's Dilemma underscores the idea that companies without an ability to adapt to new technologies or see problems that are coming down the road are almost certain to lose relevancy, surrender dominance in their market, or fail entirely.
In line with this thinking, it's become imperative for companies - both small and large - to plan ahead for their information management solutions. On a basic level, most (if not all) companies are collecting more and more data, but they don't yet have the tools they need to "take full advantage of the data collected." Even companies who believe their current solutions suffice should be asking what comes next and preparing for more content from even more inputs.