INFORMATION OVERLOAD
Information overload is a mounting problem in the workplace, but there are ways of simplifying information search and retrieval, says Itamar Ankorion, Director of Product Marketing
While email and other productivity tools have made it easier for managers to communicate and connect with one another, they have also undoubtedly contributed to the problem of information overload, threatening to undo the productivity benefits such tools promise to deliver in the first place.
Research conducted by Loudhouse Research on behalf of Attunity found that poor processes in collating, sharing and absorbing information lead to unnecessary time loss and manager frustration. On average, UK managers spend 11 hours a week preparing information while the average in the US was 12 hours a week, and half of all managers interviewed think they spend more time than they should handling information.
Whether it is structured data – collected by standard industry applications – or unstructured and semi-structured data – such as email threads, documents and Web pages – managers are certainly not short of data in today’s workplace. The problem this creates for managers is one of relevance and context; what is relevant amongst the information they have access to and in what context should it be considered?
The evolution of sophisticated technologies for organizing and searching information, now allows today’s knowledge workers to assimilate vast amounts of raw data, offering the potential of unprecedented levels of perspective and insight. However, that opportunity will only be realized if workers can assimilate relevant information in the right context. In other words, managers need to be able to filter information contextually around their area of focus, and gather, correlate and index new data as also being relevant.
Introducing the human element
Searching for information is a highly individual and personal activity; everyone has his or her own method of identifying and categorizing information. There are also few ways of automating information search and retrieval to date.
Management and other top talent are paid for their expertise, relationships, networks, cognitive skills and experience in managing the unplanned, unstructured, non-routine and highly complex activities of an organization. Yet traditionally, technology has focused almost exclusively on systemizing and automating the routine, transactional process-centric activities within a business.
With more organizations waking up to the fact that their true corporate IP lies in unleashing the creativity, knowledge and experience of senior management, a new breed of workplace applications has emerged that focuses on augmentation rather than automation and accessing underlying expertise rather than systemizing standard practices.
Composite workplace applications focus on improving the people-driven activities of an organization that are more human-intensive and collaborative by nature. Essentially, there are four ‘pillars’ workplace applications are based on:
- Information access, search and correlation
- Collaborative, social and participatory working
- Knowledge, history and learning
- Speed, configurability and productivity
This article will be examining the first pillar – the ability to assimilate, search and correlate information in context – to demonstrate how managers can overcome the problem of information overload in today’s workplace.
Putting information in context
The value of information comes as a tool that supports the management of business activities. It is within the context of these activities that value can be derived and effectiveness gained. Management actions can be broken down into three recognizable stages:
- Assess – view current, historical and previous actions and activities within context; evaluate external factors and market dynamics; consider existing company guidelines, strategy, industry frameworks and regulations; communicate and garner other people’s perspectives (collective intelligence); add personal insight and gauge opinion;
- Action – initiate a course of actions, activities and meetings, assign tasks and communicate with peers, subordinates and superiors;
- Monitor – follow-up, progress and monitor status of the initiative, activities, actions and tasks to ensure timely execution, and monitor original assumptions and criteria.
To be able to carry out these steps requires contextual input from four distinct ‘information sources’:
- Internal structured and unstructured information – typically internal from systems, applications, processes and document repositories;
- External structured and unstructured information – typically from sources such as the Web or service providers, such as D&B;
- Information in the form of company or industry frameworks, regulations, rules, guiding principles or even broad strategies;
- Individual and personal experience, knowledge, networks, relationships and intuition.
Although personal productivity tools, such as email and spreadsheets, assist with some aspects, they do not help in managing business activities to keep these activities and their related information in context. This can slow down the time taken to find a solution to a problem, does not provide any formal integration with an organization’s business processes, and delivers no real control over the path and progression of the actions, so the context or business topic can be lost or diluted over time. The result is inefficient and costly management actions, which have a negative impact on productivity and, ultimately, a company’s bottom line.
What organizations need is a way of helping their top talent find the information they need to capitalize on their expertise, knowledge and credentials, while keeping focused on the context of the issue at any one time.
Attunity InFocus simplifies information search and retrieval
Attunity InFocus is a software platform for composite workplace applications, that allow managers to focus on the end-to-end management of dynamic business activities. It emphasizes augmentation over automation, and facilitation of experience and participatory collaboration rather than simple systemization. In addition, it is setting a new standard for application delivery time, introducing rapid delivery and configuration of composite workplace applications delivered in weeks not months or years.
Importantly, Attunity InFocus brings context to information search and retrieval. The InFocus Workplace – the user interface for InFocus – brings together in one place all the relevant information, people and activities, managed in the context of a particular issue/business activity. This has productivity benefits, since managers no longer need to switch between numerous applications or search different information sources to understand the context of the issue that they’re investigating.
Attunity InFocus enables manages to:
- Collaborate with others around a managed subject or business activity
- Initiate and track activities
- View and drill down to all relevant information (internal or external)
- Define alerts and receive multi-channel notifications
- Add personal insight and knowledge
- Keep a point-in-time snapshot of the workplace for future reference
- View a journal of historical activities and associated snapshots
Leveraging nearly 20 years of data integration expertise, Attunity InFocus accelerates and simplifies information integration, navigation and monitoring, from structured and unstructured data, internal or external to the organization.
With so much information threatening to overwhelm today’s knowledge workers and senior managers, Attunity InFocus cuts through the ‘white noise’ in today’s organizations to deliver only the information that’s relevant to a particular issue. As a result, senior managers can focus on sharing and communicating their core expertise, knowledge and skills effectively, more rapidly resolve issues, take advantage of identified business opportunities and focus their efforts and actions on driving the organization forward. This is, after all, where management should be spending their efforts, rather than gathering and compiling data.
To find out more about Attunity’s innovative workplace application platform, contact Itamar.ankorion@attunity.com