Information dancing

This article won't tell you anything at all. There will be no information in it worth the name. That way, you won't risk an attack of Information Overload Syndrome by reading it. If only Reuters were so thoughtful. They sponsor the research that discovers the syndrome but do they put their hands up and stop delivering information? No. They make sure as many people as possible get to hear about it. And the poor souls whose sufferings are recorded in the research, what can be done for them? The answer is simple. First, they should be shown a few items of junk mail on a tray. They should be asked to memorise them, the way we used to in those odd party games our old folks insisted on at Christmas. Then they should be shown a few items of information of the kind they claim are making them ill. They would have to memorise them, too. Then, instead of having to recite the items in the two categories they had been shown, they could be asked whether they had got the point yet or whether it would have to be spelt out. There is junk mail and there is information. Junk mail is a nuisance but not a health risk. It might become a health risk if you read it all and tried to act on it. Get a quote on double-glazing, place an order through the mail-order catalogue, answer a simple question to get a free sample of shampoo, reveal every detail of your shopping habits to go into the draw for a West Indian holiday. Or ... do nothing, and throw it all away. Most of the so-called information produced by Information Technology is flannel. You could safely ignore it. 'But what about the bits that are genuinely useful?' you ask; 'If I ignore all of it, I'll miss them - so I have to look at everything.' No. You know what you need to know to do your job. You always have done. You wouldn't be able to do it otherwise. Also, you know where to go to look for it. What helps you do your job better is usually experience, your own or somebody else's. When someone else passes on their experience that may count as information but it isn't what the Reuters survey had in mind. They meant information apparently coming in through the window. It may occasionally help, but not when the window is always open and the stuff comes through in tidal waves. The trend, over most of this century, has actually been in the other direction. If anything, you probably need to know less to do your job than would formerly have been the case. At most levels of employment, there has been a tendency towards greater specialisation. Why else would people witter on about teams and workgroups? OK, what about those T-shaped managers, you say. What about them. Someone who knows a bit about a few things and a good deal about running a business? The people haven't changed, just the way they are referred to. Find a label - in this case, T-shaped - and find a plausible definition and, bingo, you have the material for a book, a lecture tour and a boost into management consultancy as the latest guru. From that position, you find yourself in a position to contribute to Information Overload Syndrome, not suffer it. Graeme Kenyon is a Director of Meta Guru.