Background According to the Carnegie Mellon School an organization's ability to process information is at the core of organizational and managerial
competency, and an organization's strategies must be designed to improve information processing capability and as information systems that provide that capability became formalised and automated, competencies were severely tested at many levels. It was recognised that organisations needed to be able to learn and adapt in ways that were never so evident before and academics began to organise and publish definitive works concerning the strategic management of information, and information systems. Concurrently, the ideas of
business process management and
knowledge management although much of the optimistic early thinking about
business process redesign has since been discredited in the information management literature. In the strategic studies field, it is considered of the highest priority the understanding of the information environment, conceived as the aggregate of individuals, organizations, and systems that collect, process, disseminate, or act on information. This environment consists of three interrelated dimensions which continuously interact with individuals, organizations, and systems. These dimensions are the physical, informational, and cognitive.
Aligning technology and business strategy with information management Venkatraman has provided a simple view of the requisite capabilities of an organisation that wants to manage information well – the
DIKAR model (see above). He also worked with others to understand how technology and business strategies could be appropriately aligned in order to identify specific capabilities that are needed. This work was paralleled by other writers in the world of consulting, practice, and academia.
A contemporary portfolio model for information Bytheway has collected and organised basic tools and techniques for information management in a single volume.
Stage 2: Tagging the noise on the
World Wide Web: use existing schemes such as
post codes and
GPS data or more typically by adding “tags”, or construct a formal
ontology that provides structure. Shirky provides an overview of these two approaches.
Stage 3: Sifting and analysing: in the wider world the generalised ontologies that are under development extend to hundreds of entities and hundreds of relations between them and provide the means to elicit meaning from large volumes of data. Structured data in databases works best when that structure reflects a higher-level information model – an ontology, or an
entity-relationship model.
Stage 4: Structuring and archiving: with the large volume of data available from sources such as the
social web and from the miniature
telemetry systems used in personal
health management, new ways to archive and then trawl data for information.
Map-reduce methods, originating from
functional programming, are a more recent way of eliciting information from large archival
datasets that is becoming interesting to regular businesses that have data resources to work with, but it requires advanced multi-processor resources.
Competencies to manage information well In 2004, the management system "
Information Management Body of Knowledge" was first published on the World Wide Web and set out to show that the required management competencies to derive real benefits from an investment in information are complex and multi-layered. The framework model that is the basis for understanding competencies comprises six "knowledge" areas and four "process" areas: ;The information management knowledge areas The IMBOK is based on the argument that there are six areas of required management competency, two of which ("business process management" and "business information management") are very closely related. •
Information technology: The pace of change of
technology and the pressure to constantly acquire the newest technological products can undermine the stability of the
infrastructure that supports systems, and thereby optimises
business processes and delivers benefits. It is necessary to manage the "
supply side" and recognise that technology is, increasingly, becoming a
commodity. •
Information system: While historically information systems were developed
in-house, over the years it has become possible to acquire most of the software systems that an organisation needs from the
software package industry. However, there is still the potential for
competitive advantage from the implementation of new systems ideas that deliver to the strategic intentions of organisations. •
Business benefit: What are the benefits that we are seeking? It is necessary not only to be brutally honest about what
can be achieved, but also to ensure the active management and assessment of benefit delivery. Since the emergence and popularisation of the
Balanced scorecard there has been huge interest in business performance management but not much serious effort has been made to relate business performance management to the benefits of information technology investments and the introduction of new
information systems until the turn of the
millennium. •
Projects: Information technology is without value until it is engineered into information systems that meet the needs of the business by means of good
project management. •
Business change: The best information systems succeed in delivering benefits through the achievement of change within the business systems, but people do not appreciate change that makes new demands upon their skills in the ways that new information systems often do. Contrary to common expectations, there is some evidence that the
public sector has succeeded with information technology induced
business change. •
Business operations: With new systems in place, with
business processes and
business information improved, and with staff finally ready and able to work with new processes, then the business can get to work, even when new systems extend far beyond the boundaries of a single business. •
Performance management:
Investments are no longer solely about financial results, financial success must be balanced with internal efficiency,
customer satisfaction, and with
organisational learning and development.
Summary There are always many ways to see a business, and the information management viewpoint is only one way. Other areas of business activity will also contribute to strategy – it is not only good information management that moves a business forwards.
Corporate governance,
human resource management,
product development and
marketing will all have an important role to play in strategic ways, and we must not see one domain of activity alone as the sole source of strategic success. On the other hand, corporate governance, human resource management, product development and marketing are all dependent on effective information management, and so in the final analysis our competency to manage information well, on the broad basis that is offered here, can be said to be predominant. ==Operationalising information management==