Information Losing Value/Impeding Decision Making?

[RBerkman at aol.com]

(Cross posted to two lists; apologize for any duplication)

Web4lib folks,

Recently I've been doing some research on issues related to the information
glut, and a few of my preliminary thoughts are something I'd like to get all
of your opinions on.

According to a study by Reuters, called "Dying for Information", information
overload is actually causing people to get sick. According to that survey of
1,200 managers published in October 1996, 40% of managers say that their work
environment is extermeley stressful, 94% say it will get worse, blaming the
Internet and Intranets. 44% of managers report that the cost of collecting
information is exceeding its value to business.

Nobel laureate economist Herbert Simon,says that information consumes
something very valuable: your attention. In his words:

"What information consumes is rather obvious: it consumes the attention of
its recipients. Hence, a welath of information creates a poverty of
attention, and a need to allocate that attention efficiently among the
overabundance of information sources that might consume it."(Scientific
American, September, 1995)

This allseems to  raise two key questions:

1. Since information is used as an aid to decision making, and not really for
its own sake, as we all begin to spend more and more time dealing with
information, is the current danger that it will be over rather than
underemphasized as an input to the decision making process, crowding out
other important matters such as time to think and reflect, discuss with
others, etc.?

2. As the amount of information and its accessibility increases via the web,
news filters and "webcasting" services (see Business Week 2/24/97), will its
inherent thereby value lessen? And once information value's lessens, does its
importance as the key business resource  decline as well? 

This is not to say that information will be seen as valueless. Rather, will
access to timely, relevant information  be seen as more akin to access to
having, say, good telephone service: a basic business service, critical for
conducting business, but hardly something that provides a critical
competitive edge? 

If the two above points are true, and information is no longer a scarce
resource, but, in fact, something that consumes too much of our time and
attention.  what then is today the critical scarce resource? Perhaps
 insight?

Insight, it seems, does require access to relevant, timely and credible
external information, but also draws on more. It requires a broad
understanding of where the world is going and the key forces that are going
to make for changes; knowledge of one's own organization, it's mission.
challenges, and unique strength. And good judgement  according to Alvin
Toffler, "cannot be taught, it can only come from experience." (Honest
profits, Andelman, David A, Management   Review  v86n1  PP:   30-32  Jan
  1997 ).
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Anyway, perhaps these thoughts will spur some discussion.

Thanks for your input,

Bob Berkman
Editor
The Information Advisor