 The magazine of the Melbourne PC User Group Editorial Carol Daniels cad@melbpc.org.au |
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Information management
Why is it that as I write those words, I'm hearing a chorus of my fellow Melb PC members breaking into "To dream the impossible dream..." in four-part harmony? Maybe I'm projecting. I don't think so. Everywhere I turn these days, I find articles proclaiming the perils of the information age. Although, it may not be any consolation to find you are not alone. Whether you call it "information overload", "info glut", or "stop the modem, my hard drive is full!" you may find yourself feeling as if you're drowning in a sea of information.
In the twentieth century, we are faced with more new information than ever before. That's old news. What's got our attention now is the effect this tide of information has on us.
That's where the theme for this issue kicks in. Along with being exposed to previously unheard of amounts of information, coming at us more quickly than ever before, we now find that we are expected not only to know about, but to be able to put our fingers on, masses of information on a wide range of issues, all at a moment's notice. It's not good enough just to have it, there's an expectation that we will (somehow) manage it, process it, make sense of it.
The Internet hasn't made things easier. Despite being one of the archetypal images of the information age, much of what's available on the Internet is raw, unfiltered data rather than information. It takes work, digging and searching to find the useful, reliable information.
Of course we've always needed to analyse data and manage information. Knowledge has always been a hard won goal. But the task is more difficult, as the volume of information grows.
No one's immune
Information overload isn't just a concern for managers in multinational corporations or large bureaucracies. It strikes at every level of every organisation.
Even non-organisations, suffer from it. Home-based business operators aren't likely to have an assistant to keep track of meetings and project deadlines, let alone type correspondence or attend to the delicate balance between paying accounts as they come due, while trying to entice debtors to pay as soon as possible.
Even families suffer from the demands of the information age. Just keeping track of a small family's social obligations would have stymied business managers at the turn of the century.
As an information junkie or "infomaniac" (a term I prefer, but has sometimes been misunderstood), I've been searching for the perfect information management system for as long as I can remember. I won't get your hopes up, only to crush them at the bottom of the page. I'll confess now. I haven't found it...yet.
Not for want of trying
Owners of office supply stores on two continents rub their hands with glee when they see me enter their establishments, chequebook in hand. I've tried file folders and tickler files (not nearly as much fun as they sound). I've used Day Runners(tm) and Filofaxes(tm). I've experimented with more database programs that than I care to remember. In the end I always return to my own, "CG&G" (colour, geographical and geological) system.
In this soon-to-be-patented system (as soon as I find the forms) data access is linked to colour (of the paper), geography (what I was doing and where I was doing it when I discovered the item and "filed" it) and geology (how long ago I "filed" it). The files are vertical, so I'm positive that at the bottom of the files, the organic components of the paper and ink are decomposing, liberating carbon atoms - which, under the influence of the immense pressure that exists at the deepest levels - will soon be transformed into a stash of diamonds the likes of which have never before been seen.
Now that I have that off my chest, I feel much better, and you'll know better than to come to me for advice about managing information.
I haven't thrown in the towel, only focused my efforts on areas where I'm more likely to succeed, such as turning off the tap, or at least taking more control of the flow, of information coming into my life, by:
- Filtering: I used to read (and I mean read) three daily papers. Now I subscribe to news filtering services and skim the daily paper in the evening. I've cut back on the number of newsgroups I read too. There was a time when I subscribed to hundreds of groups. I've got it down to twenty or so, only half of which I read every day. Instead of newsgroups, I subscribe to moderated and controlled subscription mailing lists, where the signal to noise ratio is much better.
- Automating: I've automated the way I process some e-mail. Not all of it. When you regularly get more than 100 messages a day, there's no way to handle everything individually. One word of caution, be careful when you're setting your filters. Check that they do what you expect them to do. From personal experience I can tell you that it's embarrassing to berate your brother because he hasn't replied to a number of e-mail messages, only to discover his replies incorrectly sorted to a folder you only check once a quarter!
- Scanning: With the right size type on the screen, and well formatted documents, I scan scrolling text, only stopping to read when something grabs me. It's a great way to get through long documents, especially those that may only be related, tangentially, to your current needs.
- Evaluating: Taking filtering one step further, I'm ruthless about what I continue. For example I give a mailing list one month to make an impression on me. If it hasn't, I unsubscribe.
Reprinted from the June 1997 issue of PC Update, the magazine of Melbourne PC User Group, Australia
