Information Management and New Media

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Information Management and New Media

• Rafael Capurro
• www.capurro.de
• Steinbeis-Seminar MBA
• 2007

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WELCOME!

3
Overview

• Introduction
• Information Resources
• IRM and Knowledge Management
• External Information Resources
• The Process of External IRM
• Use External IR for Decision Makers

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Introduction Scope of the seminar

• This seminar deals mainly with the field of
  external information resources and management.

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Literature

• Combs Combs, Richard E. Why Manage Knowledge?
  In http//www.combsinc.com/index.html
• Nickols Nickols, F. W. (2000).  The knowledge
  in knowledge management.  In Cortada, J.W.
  Woods, J.A. (Eds) The knowledge management
  yearbook 2000-2001 (pp. 12-21). Boston, MA
  Butterworth-Heinemann
• In http//home.att.net/nickols/Knowledge_in_KM.h
  tm
• Walt Van der Walt, Marthinus A Classification
  Scheme for the Organization of Electronic
  Documents in Small, Medium and Micro Enterprises
  (SMMEs). Knowl. Org. 31 (2004) 1, 26-38.
• Microsoft Office Share Point
• http//www.redmondintegrators.com/upload/SharePoin
  tEvaluate_386.pdf
• See also the website of the seminar
  http//www.capurro.de/steinbeis_infomanag.htm

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Introduction The Goal of Information Management

• Providing
• reliable and relevant knowledge
• at the right time
• in the right place
• for the right person
• in the right medium

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Introduction Organizational Memory

• Internal external information (and knowledge)
  resources Organizational Memory

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Introduction The Goal of IRM

• Watch your IR!
• Watch your IRM!

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Introduction The IRM Process

• Identify
• Collect
• Organize (Classify)
• Share
• Adapt
• Use
• Create
• Identify

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Introduction The IRM Process

• Evaluation Criteria
• Price commercial/free
• Quality professional/vulgar
• Share secret/public
• Access difficult/easy
• Origin extern/intern
• Media digital/non-digital
• Awareness full/non
• Meta-criteria Profit, Corporate Social
  Responsibility (CSR), Environment

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Introduction The IRM process

• IRM is very important in the highly competitive
  environment.
• IRM can become your competitive advantage that
  will help you to win in the competition run.

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Introduction Benchmarking of IRM

• 1. Compare your IRM with your competitor.
• 2. Find out what to focus on.
• 3. Take action to improve.

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Introduction Tools for IRM

• SAP
• ORACLE
• IBM Lotus
• CSB International
• Livelink
• Verity
• Microsoft Office Share Point Server

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Introduction IRM Requirements

• Source Windows SharePoint Services
• http//www.redmondintegrators.com/upload/SharePoin
  tEvaluate_386.pdf
• I want to share contact lists, event calendars,
  and annoucements with my team, my customers, and
  my partners
• I want to easily share a document with my team
  members for review
• I want a web site where I can manage my meetings

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Introduction IRM Requirements

• I want my employees to create their own Web sites
  without any help from the IT department
• I want support for managing unused Web sites
• I wand documents attached to incoming e-mail
  messages to be added to a document library
  automatically

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Introduction IRM Requirements

• I want version control for specific documents
• I want to be notified automatically whenever
  documents are changed
• I want to search and find only the documents that
  are on my team site
• I want to target content to users based on job
  roles or interests

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Introduction IRM Requirements

• I want permanent portals for my organization and
  divisions
• I want to integrate enterprise applications with
  a portal
• I want users to have personal sites where they
  can manage and share information with other users

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Introduction IRE Requirements

• I want to easily create, manage, and organize
  SharePoint sites
• I want to browse for information by topic
• I want to have multiple portals that use the same
  index.

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Introduction and solution(s)

• Microsoft SharePoint Services and Microsoft
  Orffice SharePoint Portal Server. Features
• News and Topics
• My Site
• Information targeted to specific audiences
• Indexing and searching accross file shares, Web
  servers, secure Web servres
• Alerts that notify you when changes are made to
  relevant information
• Single sign-on for enterprise application
  integration

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Introduction and solutions

• The Gilbane Group Survey on enterprise blog,
  wiki, and RSS use (2005)
• http//gilbane.com/surveys.html
• RSSRich Site Summary / Really Simple
  Syndication. See more at http//en.wikipedia.org/
  wiki/RSS

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Introduction and solutions

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Introduction and solutions

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Introduction and solutions

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Introduction and solutions

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Introduction and solutions

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Internal IR

• Internal information resources
• Are produced by company employees.
• They emanate from
• functional areas
• cross-functional processes

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Internal IR

• Functional areas
• Production such as documentation on the
  purchasing of materials and equipment
  (information sheets from suppliers, orders, bills
  etc.), records of quality control, delivery,
  notes, guarantee cards delivery from customers,
  servicing records and customer records.

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Internal IR

• Sales and marketing market research reports,
  product brochures and information sheets, orders
  from customers and records of sales transactions.

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Internal IR

• Engineering (Research and Development) project
  planning documentation, laboratory notes, project
  reports.
• Accounting and finance budgets, regular
  financial reports on income and expenditure,
  documentation relating to taxes, records of
  investments and assets, etc.

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Internal IR

• Human resources management job descriptions,
  advertisements for vacancies, documents relating
  to employee benefits, employment contracts,
  training manuals, employee records (records of
  payment, leav and disciplinary hearings).

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Internal IR

• Cross-functional processes
• Product development reports
• Business plans
• Competitive intelligence reports.

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External IR

• External information resources
• Many information items gathered for the purposes
  of competitive intelligence support the
  cross-functional business processes, especially
  strategic planning and decision-making.

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External IR

• In the creation of a business plan, which can
  include processes such as the setting of
  strategic goals, determining niche market
  segments and deciding about mergers with, or
  acquisitions of, competitors, the top management
  of a company has to rely heavily on external
  information resources. Walt 2004, 30

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External IR

• Gathering external IR focuses on
• Political, environmental, societal, and
  technological trends (P.E.S.T.)
• Customers
• Suppliers
• Competitors (competing products and services)

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External IRM

• Methodological aspects
• How to identify, collect, organize, share, adapt,
  use, and create information from external sources
  that are useful for the company.

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IRM and Knowledge Management

• Knowledge taxonomy
• Explicit, Implicit, Tacit
• Declarative (know that) and Procedural (know how)

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Explicit Knowledge

• Explicit knowledge () is knowledge that has
  been articulated and, more often than not,
  captured in the form of text, tables, diagrams,
  product specifications and so on.

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Explicit Knowledge

• In a well-known and frequently cited 1991 Harvard
  Business Review article titled "The Knowledge
  Creating Company," Ikujiro Nonaka refers to
  explicit knowledge as "formal and systematic" and
  offers product specifications, scientific
  formulas and computer programs as examples.
  Nickols
• See also
• Nonaka, I. / Takeuchi, H The Knowledge Creating
  Company, Oxford 1995.
• Von Krogh, G. / Ichijo, K. / Nonaka, I. Enabling
  Knowledge Creation. Oxford 2000

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Implicit Knowledge

• Knowledge that can be articulated but hasnt is
  implicit knowledge. Its existence is implied by
  or inferred from observable behavior or
  performance. Nickols

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Implicit Knowledge

• In analyzing the task in which underwriters at
  an insurance company processed applications, for
  instance, it quickly became clear that the range
  of outcomes for the underwriters work took three
  basic forms (1) they could approve the policy
  application, (2) they could deny it or (3) they
  could counter offer.

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Implicit Knowledge

• Yet, not one of the underwriters articulated
  these as boundaries on their work at the outset
  of the analysis. Once these outcomes were
  identified, it was a comparatively simple matter
  to identify the criteria used to determine the
  response to a given application. In so doing,
  implicit knowledge became explicit
  knowledge.Nickols

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Tacit Knowledge

• Tacit knowledge is knowledge that cannot be
  articulated. As Michael Polanyi (1997), the
  chemist-turned-philosopher who coined the term
  put it, "We know more than we can tell." Polanyi
  used the example of being able to recognize a
  persons face but being only vaguely able to
  describe how that is done. This is an instance of
  pattern recognition. ()

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Tacit Knowledge

• Reading the reaction on a customers face or
  entering text at a high rate of speed using a
  word processor offer other instances of
  situations in which we are able to perform well
  but unable to articulate exactly what we know or
  how we put it into practice. In such cases, the
  knowing is in the doing, a point to which we will
  return shortly. Nickols

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Implict, Tacit and Explicit Knowledge

• Nickols

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Declarative and Procedural Knowledge

• The explicit, implicit, tacit categories of
  knowledge are not the only ones in use. Cognitive
  psychologists sort knowledge into two categories
  declarative and procedural. Some add strategic as
  a third category. Nickols

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Declarative Knowledge

• Declarative knowledge has much in common with
  explicit knowledge in that declarative knowledge
  consists of descriptions of facts and things or
  of methods and procedures.Nickols

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Procedural Knowledge

• This is an area where important differences of
  opinion exist.
• One view of procedural knowledge is that it is
  knowledge that manifests itself in the doing of
  something. As such it is reflected in motor or
  manual skills and in cognitive or mental
  skills.Nickols

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Procedural Knowledge

• Another view of procedural knowledge is that it
  is knowledge about how to do something. This view
  of procedural knowledge accepts a description of
  the steps of a task or procedure as procedural
  knowledge. The obvious shortcoming of this view
  is that it is no different from declarative
  knowledge except that tasks or methods are being
  described instead of facts or things.Nickols

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Strategic Knowledge

• Strategic knowledge is a term used by some to
  refer to what might be termed know-when and
  know-why.Nickols

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Knowledge Taxonomy

• Nickols

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Knowledge Taxonomy

• Nonaka addresses the important issues of
  knowledge transfer and knowledge creation in his
  1991 article. He cites four such transfers or
  creations

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Knwoledge Taxonomy

• Tacit to tacit. Acquiring someone elses tacit
  knowledge through observation, imitation and
  practice. The example Nonaka uses is that of a
  product developer, Ikuro Tanaka, who apprentices
  herself to a hotel chef famous for the quality of
  his bread. She learns how to make bread his way,
  including an unusual kneading technique.Nickols

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Knowledge Taxonomy

• Explicit to explicit. Combining discrete pieces
  of explicit knowledge to form new explicit
  knowledge, for example, compiling data and
  preparing a report that analyzes and synthesizes
  these data. The report constitutes new explicit
  knowledge.Nickols

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Knowledge Taxonomy

• Tacit to explicit. Nonaka cites here the product
  developers subsequent conversion of her acquired
  tacit knowledge into specifications for a
  bread-making machine. However, as defined by
  Polanyi, who coined the term, tacit knowledge
  cannot be articulated.

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Knowledge Taxonomy

• Explicit to tacit. Internalizing explicit
  knowledge. Here, Nonaka indicates that the
  product development team acquired new tacit
  knowledgeNickols

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Knowledge Taxonomy

• http//www.12manage.com/methods_nonaka_seci.html
• The SECI Model (Socialization, Externalization,
  Connecting, Combination) of Nonaka/Takeuchi

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Knowledge Taxonomy

• http//www.12manage.com/methods_nonaka_seci.html

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IRM as

• management of explicit (declarative) knowledge

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External Information Resources

• Internet Resources
• Providers of Scientific, Technical and Economic
  Information
• Library Resources

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External Information Resources

• 1) Internet Resources
• Portals/Websites Professional Associations,
  Competitors, Customers
• Search Engines Catalogues, General Search
  Engines Meta-Search Engines, Trade and Business
  Search Engines, Shopping Search Engines
• Blogs
• Mailing Lists
• Virtual Communities

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External Information Resources

• 2) Providers of Scientific, Technical and
  Economic Information
• German Providers
• STN International (Scientific and Technical
  Information, Patents)
• GENIOS (German Business Information)
• FIZ Technik (Technology)
• Hoppenstedt (Economic Information)
• Handelsblatt (Economic Information)

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External Information Resources

• International Providers
• Gale Directory of Data Bases
• DIALOG (All fields)
• LexisNexis (Economy, law)
• Questel-Orbit (All fields)
• Bureau van Dijk (Companies)

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External Information Resources

• Libraries See seminar web site!

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The Process of IRM Organize!

• Organize your IRM process
• Create an (interactive) platform within the
  company (as part of the intranet)
• Create a list of links (portals, websites, etc.)
• Use Mailing List and blogs
• Inform actively about IR within the company
• Get feed back from your colleagues about the IR
  as well as about the IRM process itself
• Set goals for special tasks and make case
  analysis of IR and IRM within your company.

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The Process of external IRM Step by Step

• Identify
• Collect
• Organize (Classify)
• Share
• Adapt
• Use
• Create
• Identify

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The Process of IRM Identify

• What kind of external IR are used in your
  company?
• Portals/Websites Professional Associations,
  Competitors, Customers
• Search Engines
• Blogs
• Wikis
• Social Bookmarks
• Mailing Lists, forums
• Virtual Communities

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The Process of IRM Collect

• How are external IR collected in your company?
• Using Search Engines?
• Visiting (regularly) Portals/Websites?
• Using an Agent System?
• Using SDI for searching in professional data
  bases?
• Visiting fairs?
• Connecting with experts?
• Using blogs, wikis, mailing lists?
• Using printed sources?

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The Process of IRM Organize

• How are the files with external information
  organized in your company?
• Document Management?
• Intranet?
• ...

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The Process of IRM Organize

• Under the heading Organizing files using
  folders in the help files of Microsoft Windows
  2000, for example, the user is simply told to
  create folders for categories that match the way
  you want to organize your information. (Walt)

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The Process of IRM Organize

• Walts Classification Scheme
• 0 General documents
• 1 External environment
• 2 Management (General)
• 3 Finance (financial management)
• 4 Human resources
• 5 Products Services
• 6 Marketing Sales
• 7 Customers
• 8 Special collections
• 9 Other subjects

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The Process of IRM Organize

• The role of classification in business
  documentation (Walt)
• Categories are used for organizing folder systems
• Categories become part of the metadata for
  Information Retrieval purposes
• Categories are used for structuring the intranet

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The Process of IRM Share

• How are external IR shared in your company?
• Intranet
• e-Mail
• Mailing lists
• Virtual forums
• Communities of Practice
• Blogs, wikis, RSS, social bookmarks (Social
  Software)
• Print media
• Face-to-face meetings

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The Process of IRM Adapt

• How are external IR adapted to the goals (vision,
  mission) of your company?
• Selecting the information from the sources?
• Distributing/writing (executive) abstracts?
• Evaluating?

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The Process of IRM Use

• Who and how uses external IR in your company?
• In all departments?
• Decision Making (at which level)?
• RD?
• Marketing?
• ...
• Regularly? In what form/medium?

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The Process of IRM Create

• How is new knowledge on the basis of external IR
  created in your company
• For decision making?
• For marketing?
• For RD?
• For dealing with (new) customers?
• For dealing with competitors?

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The Process of IRM Evaluate

• Evaluate regularly the IRM process
• Who is responsible for what?
• Where are the blockades?
• Where are the blind spots?
• What are the main areas of concern (priorities)?
• How much does it cost?
• What are the revenues?

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The Process of IRM Checking List

• Create a check list for evaluating regularly your
  (external) IRM Process
• What external IR do you use in your company?
• How do you manage these resources?
• How much money does your company spend in them?
• How much money does your company spend for the
  IRM process itself?
• What is the revenue?
• How (and how often) does the evaluation of the
  IRM take place in your company?

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Use External IR for Decision Makers

• Use all possible information sources in order to
  build a data base that corresponds to the needs
  of your company
• Consider that the kind of information you select
  will make possible or not to visualize the status
  of your company according to diverse criteria.
  These criteria should be as clear as possible
  before (!) you create the data base

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Presenting Information for Decision Makers

• Building a Data Base
• Products
• Price
• Placement
• Promotion
• -gt Present Status / Advantages and Disadvantages

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Visualizing Results

• Cash Cows
• Bad Dogs
• ?
• Stars

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Visualising Results

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Visualising Results

• Select two criteria, for instance
• Price vs. Placement
• Market share vs. Market growth
• Product quality vs. Price
• in order to visualize where your company is and
  where do you place your competitors
• Do this kind of visualisation regularly and
  compare the results from time to time

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Taking Decisions

• Decisions are taken on the basis of information
  provided.
• Due to the necessary simplification of
  information selection as well as of the criteria
  used, decisions are always a risk.
• Information should be seen in the context of
  unexpected events.

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Evaluating Decisions

• After taking a decision, the processes of
  information and of visualisation start again
• You should consider the possibility of selecting
  information from other resources and/or
  re-organizing your IRM process.

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Thank you for your attention!