More than ever before, information is all around us and, while most people take it for granted, few can define the term. The word “information” in English is rather flexible and it means many things to many people.

The Urra-hubullu encyclopedia, one of the earilest of its kind

To borrow from Justice Potter Stewart, who was writing about the difficulty of defining “obscenity,” I know information when I see it.

When we need a phone number, we dial “information” (well, we used to, before the Web). We get information about a specific event (a party, a wedding) and we get information when we read a newspaper (be it online or a printed version).

We get information when we chitchat and we get information when we attend meetings and conferences.

The American Heritage Dictionary has one of the better definitions I’ve found, namely “knowledge derived from study, experience, or instruction.” It goes on to add “Knowledge of specific events or situations that has been gathered or received by communication; intelligence or news” and “A collection of facts or data.”

A brief look at the roots and origin of the word “information” also helps us to better understand it. The word comes from the Old French “informacion,” which in turn came from the Latin “informationem” (nominative “information”), which means an outline, concept, or idea. Informationem was the noun of action from informare, from which we derive our verb “inform.”

But I digress.

The reason information is important is because human beings simply have had to communicate with one another since the dawn of civilization. From cave paintings and oral history to the beginnings of a written tradition, mankind has documented and recorded that which is important and left it for future generations.

An increase in the human population, combined with improved tools for sharing information (starting with the tablet, paper, movable type, and going all the way into the computer age), has resulted in more information being created today than perhaps anyone had ever anticipated. What haven’t been developed in lockstep with this are tools that allow us to filter information so we get not only what we need but also that which we can absorb.

Despite great technological advances, we actually understand very little about how to manage information. Until we do learn more about managing what really has become a flood of information, all we can do is try to cope with the reality of Information Overload.

This Analyst Opinion is also available online at

Jonathan B. Spira is CEO and Chief Analyst at Basex.

It’s hard to avoid information. Not only do we live in a world full of it, making it nearly impossible to escape, but for some perverse reason, we actually like it.

Is it too much yet?

Indeed, we like it so much that we continuously create more of it and have even designed machines to do this for us as well.  In addition, we frequently compile information into metrics and ratios that describe other information.

A recent survey by a computer company showed that 90% of information was only looked at once after it was created.  The current Basex survey on how knowledge workers work already tells us that 50% of us spend one to two hours of our days creating information – and 15% spend more than three hours.  (If you haven’t already taken the survey, click here to do it now .)

Is this figure simply too high and are we in fact simply creating more information, not for its value but purely for the sake of making the pile bigger?

As we go about our day, it might be wise to cast a critical eye on our work that results in the creation of more information and ask ourselves some hard questions.  One, what is the practical purpose of the information that we are creating, and two, is it important enough to justify burdening others with it?

A quote generally attributed to Albert Einstein notes that “[N]ot everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted.”

Perhaps it would do us all good to think about why we are creating so much information, and whether perhaps we could get by with a bit less of it.

Jonathan B. Spira is CEO and Chief Analyst at Basex.

To find out a bit more about how knowledge workers spend their days and how Information Overload impacts them, a few weeks ago we launched a brief survey that asks you to look at your most recent full day at work and answer a few questions. If you haven’t already taken the survey, please stop here and take it now.

And how was your day?

Now that a few hundred people have taken the survey, we would like to share some preliminary results with you.

— 63% of knowledge workers feel they don’t have enough time to get all of their work done.

— 49% of knowledge workers feel that the amount of information they are presented with on daily basis is detrimental to getting their work done.

— 58% of those surveyed feel overwhelmed by information to the point of incapacity at least several times a week.

— 29% of knowledge workers have no time at all for thought and reflection during their day, and 58% had only between 15 and 30 minutes.

Please also help us get the word out about the survey by posting a link to it on your company’s intranet, your blog, your Facebook page, and anywhere else where knowledge workers might congregate. The more people participating in the survey, the better we will be able to take the first steps to increase our own productivity.

Participants will receive an Executive Summary of the survey’s findings and can also enter a drawing to win a set of Dilbert CubeGuard information overload blockers (three sets will be awarded).

Jonathan B. Spira is CEO and Chief Analyst at Basex.

How we, as knowledge workers, spend our day is something that we ourselves tend to not fully understand. 

Dilbert is currently busy…

Our impressions of what we have done in the course of a day are frequently far different than what really took place.  Dilbert famously noted that “Mondays are not part of the productive work week” and this is just the tip of the iceberg.

To find out a bit more about how we work, we’ve launched a brief survey that asks you to look at your most recent full day at work and answer a few questions.

Please click here to take the survey.

Participants will receive an Executive Summary of the survey’s findings and can also enter a drawing to win a set of Dilbert CubeGuard information overload blockers (three sets will be awarded).  After you complete the survey, please share the survey link with colleagues or in forums where knowledge workers congregate; the more people participating in the survey, the better we will be able to take the first steps to increasing our own productivity.

David M. Goldes is the president of Basex.

The battle to find the right piece of content at the right moment is a never ending quest for the knowledge worker.

Calling all cars…

While most companies have organized their various internal content stores and many have contracted for authoritative external content from sources such as Factiva and LexisNexis, this is only half the battle.

All of this progress notwithstanding, a knowledge worker often has to search through multiple systems to find exactly what he is looking for.  Frequently, he may not end up with the best and most up-to-date content because the individual searches produced results different from those an aggregated search would have presented.

Comintelli, a Swedish company founded in 1999, addresses this challenge with its Knowledge XChanger offering.  The solution aggregates content from both internal and external sources and then classifies, organizes, and presents relevant items to knowledge workers.  The content is packaged and delivered to work groups in a role-based and customized format so that only the most relevant information is presented.  Additionally, users select topics and enter search terms to further drill down on an area and refine the result set.

Knowledge XChanger allows knowledge workers to publish information through an easy-to-use browser-based interface or via e-mail.  In addition, the system supports commenting, voting, and chat around content.

Users can personalize how they receive information by using automatic e-mail alerts and/or via a customized start page.

When the user does perform a search, he is tapping into content that has been drawn from vetted and authoritative sources, which could include internal sites or select external sources such as news sites as well as from content providers such as Factiva.

A particularly valuable feature in Knowledge XChanger is the ability to find experts on a given topic.  The system uses Knowledge Points, a customizable feature that assigns points to users based on activities, to determine expertise.  For instance, a user may receive points for every time he reads an article, searches on a term, or comments on content.  Users can search for individuals who have expertise in a given area.

Tools such as Knowledge XChanger are key components on the road to the development of true Collaborative Business Environments.  In addition, by aggregating and delivering timely and relevant role-based content to the knowledge worker, the system tackles several aspects of Information Overload relating to search and information management.

Finally, by supporting expertise location with the system’s ability to associate individuals in an organization with topics they have knowledge and interest, Comintelli has taken a big step in improving knowledge sharing and collaboration by connecting knowledge workers to each other and jump-starting the collaboration process.

Cody Burke is a senior analyst at Basex.

Once again, information overload and attention management are front-page news. Matt Richtel at the New York Times wrote yet another piece on this topic that appeared earlier this week in the New York Times (in the interest of full disclosure, Matt interviewed me for background information as he was preparing the piece).

Ich weiß nicht, was soll es bedeuten…

Matt’s written on this subject many times before so I wasn’t surprised that he was working on this. Unfortunately, while he found some great examples of information-overload casualties, the trends and problems he examines in this 3500+ word piece were far from revolutionary. There are many more key points he could have addressed and focused on, and I will address a few here.

Indeed, the problem of information overload isn’t a new one but it is one that has been exacerbated by the fact that 1.) we have countless new gadgets and tools that deliver “information” and 2.) the rate of information creation has increased dramatically. As a result, in order to keep up, people attempt to multitask, something that our brains simply aren’t capable of handling with any degree of efficiency.

Instead of multitasking what we actually do is task switching which is really a series of continuous interruptions. While this is done in the belief that one is being more efficient and getting more done, nothing could be farther from the truth. Each interruption comes with a penalty.

In 2003 through 2005, Basex conducted research that led us to uncover the phenomenon of “recovery time,” the time it takes an individual to return to a task after he has been interrupted. Recovery time is generally imperceptible because the individual is not aware – even if he returns to the task – that he is struggling to get back to the point at which he was before the interruption.

Each time an individual switches tasks and tries to return to the previous task, he has to go back in time and recollect his thoughts and recall exactly what he has done and what he has yet to do. Some repetitive work may be involved as well, e.g. redoing the last few steps. This of course assumes that the individual returns at all – in some instances, the task is forgotten altogether. The interruptions also increase the likelihood of errors being committed.

When this happens over and over again (which is the case for most people during the workday), the ability to devote thought and reflection to a particular task – the hallmark of the knowledge worker – becomes nearly impossible. The human brain is curious and always seeking new information. As a result, external stimuli – the beeps and bleats of technology indicating a new message or call – are like the siren Loreley, the beautiful Rhine maiden who lured passing sailors to their doom with her singing and long, golden hair.

We found that recovery time is between 10 to 20 times the duration of the interruption. That means that a 30 second interruption can result in a minimum of 5 minutes of recovery time. Added together, unnecessary interruptions plus the related recovery time can consume as much as 28% of the workday and hundreds of billions of dollars in time.

Little has changed since then. If anything, we multitask more. But we can still tame the multitasking monster – it merely requires some discipline. In the coming weeks, we’ll look at ways to do just that.

Jonathan B. Spira is CEO and Chief Analyst at Basex.

The somewhat elusive key to understanding Information Overload, and thus developing meaningful solutions to lessen its impact, is to first develop a clear picture of the amount of information that individuals receive and consume and also develop an understanding of how much information is too much in a given circumstance.

Just how hungry for information are you now?

This is a tricky set of problems because information does not lend itself to direct measurement.  Traditionally, researchers have approached this question in one of three ways, namely looking at words, bytes, or time.  A document, for instance, could be high in words, low in bytes, and high in time spent reading it.  A video clip on the other hand, could be low in words, high in bytes, and low in time.

Research conducted at the University of California, San Diego tells us that roughly 3.6 zettabytes of information were consumed by Americans in their homes in 2008.  This translates to ca. 11.8 hours a day of information consumption.  Those numbers are, as stated, for information received and consumed solely in the home and do not address business settings.

In the coming months we will begin our efforts to determine how much information knowledge workers consume in the course of their work, thereby developing a profile and understanding of the knowledge workers’ information diet.

One concept we are studying is satisficing, a method of decision making that seeks to reach an “adequate” solution to a problem, as opposed to searching relentlessly for the optimal solution that may cost more in time spent than it is worth.  Satisficing is a naturally occurring and largely subconscious thought process that probably kept humankind from starving at some point in history, when our ancestors decided that they could make do with the berries on the tree and not wait forever for the perfect mammoth to pass by.

Depending on the circumstances, knowledge workers are both under- and overusing this strategy.  This frequently leaves them with sub-par solutions to a problem or results in wasted time when a simpler solution exists.

Another interesting concept we are grappling with is how to measure information.  The Shannon entropy, developed by Claude E. Shannon in 1948, is a way to measure the average information content of a message in units such as bits.  Perhaps more intriguing, it also provides a way to measure the information content that knowledge workers miss when they are unaware of a random variable.  For example, if only the last letter of a word is missing, it would be relatively easy to determine the word, as the other letters would provide context.  However, if only one or two of the letters in the word are presented, it will be much harder to determine the word, as there is little or no context.

Since this is ongoing work, and many of you readers have backgrounds in this area, we would like to hear from you in the coming weeks.  What do you think is the most valid way to measure information?  How much work related information do you estimate you are exposed to on a daily basis and how are you making these estimates?

Please participate in the discussion below.

Jonathan B. Spira is CEO and Chief Analyst at Basex.
Cody Burke is a senior analyst at Basex.

The Information Overload Research Group (IORG) and the Basex Information Overload Network (ION) had its joint quarterly meeting on April 7.  The topic for the meeting was individual Information Overload-fighting strategies and participants brought a wide range of interesting ideas with them.

Please, tell me what to do!

Nathan Zeldes, IORG’s president, spoke about the value of e-mail management strategies such as checking e-mail only once a day, in his case at lunch, and setting up a folder system that separates messages into those that must be dealt with immediately, today, or can be followed up on later.  Another point he stressed is that e-mail should not be used as a to-do list.

Zeldes also discussed how the use of tools, such as using a powerful indexing search engine to quickly find e-mail messages or off-loading as much as possible to RSS feeds, which can help to reduce the frustrations that arise from an overloaded and unwieldy inbox.

Jonathan Spira, IORG’s vice president for research and Basex’ chief analyst, talked about how the use of multiple monitors generally increased his productivity, but how on some occasions, when under deadline or when needing to focus exclusively on one task, he will turn off the extra screen and just use one display to complete his task.

Other tools that were mentioned in the discussion included Twitter.  Maura Thomas, a principal at Burget Avenue Management Services, uses Twitter as a search tool to find relevant information, instead of browsing through headlines and RSS feeds.  She related her experience with using the service to reduce the amount of time she would have to spend looking for information that interests her; she uses Twitter to follow people who are focused on what is relevant to her and are knowledgeable in the areas of her interests.

The use of Twitter to fight Information Overload sounds like a contradiction in terms but Thomas stressed that Twitter is like any other tool and only interrupts if you let it.  In this same vein, she noted that the key to managing Information Overload is to take control and go on the offensive; do not allow yourself to be stuck in a defensive position where you are only reacting.

The issue of control was reiterated by several speakers, including Lesa Becker, director of organizational learning and development at Saint Alphonsus Regional Medical Center, and Paul Silverman, president of Integra Workshops.  Both advocated taking control of one’s information flow through mindfulness, meaning being aware of the present moment and not letting ourselves be distracted by stray thoughts, and by being conscious of the impact of the choices we make.  This includes carefully picking what technology, such as Twitter, to be involved in, based on the impact it has on you.  For some, a service such as Twitter may be helpful, for others, it may be a torrent of extraneous and irrelevant information.  Nancy Snell chimed in on this to note that Information Overload is not going to stop, so the only option is to begin making individual choices to reduce its impact.

Silverman also offered a suggestion for getting more done in a day, namely to do “the worst thing first.”  He explained that this strategy pays off because it allows the knowledge workers to take control of their day, get the most pressing and/or nagging task(s) done, and hopefully regain focus for the rest of the day by not having to spend time dreading that particularly nasty task.

Another key point that was articulated multiple times was that a knowledge worker has the ability to disengage from technology tools, as well as limit the impact those tools have on the inbox to reduce their level of Information Overload.  Jared Goralnick, CEO of AwayFind, and Bill Kirwin, vice president of research at getcontrol.net both advocated strategies such as turning off e-mail notifications from social networks, sending less e-mail so as to receive less e-mail, and generally reducing the amount of incoming information by reducing the amount of outgoing information.

A discussion of what participants learnt from the meeting is taking place on the Basex Information Overload Network’s LinkedIn page.  Feel free to join in.

Cody Burke is a senior analyst at Basex.

This week I have been thinking a lot about how poorly we manage data and information. The quality of the data and the lack of needed data has historically been an issue at work. We have focused a lot of our time on data mining but never really recognized that one day there would be too much data and information for our staff to sift through. Recently, our managers proposed two new data sources for the operational staff to review and I decided that it was time to hit the panic button that we’re currently giving out more information to our workers than they can handle.

When a business presents too much information to their staff it is a lot like catching deer in your headlights. If the deer is too overwhelmed to run and you don’t steer the car out of the way then no good can come to both car and deer. This is where I think we are at work and we’re needing to slow things down a bit to give both driver and deer time to think about their next move. For the moment at least, I’m personally at a lost on how best to solve our issues with information overload.

read more

This week I have been thinking a lot about how poorly we manage data and information. The quality of the data and the lack of needed data has historically been an issue at work. We have focused a lot of our time on data mining but never really recognized that one day there would be too much data and information for our staff to sift through. Recently, our managers proposed two new data sources for the operational staff to review and I decided that it was time to hit the panic button that we’re currently giving out more information to our workers than they can handle.

When a business presents too much information to their staff it is a lot like catching deer in your headlights. If the deer is too overwhelmed to run and you don’t steer the car out of the way then no good can come to both car and deer. This is where I think we are at work and we’re needing to slow things down a bit to give both driver and deer time to think about their next move. For the moment at least, I’m personally at a lost on how best to solve our issues with information overload.

read more