March 15, 2006

Turning Information Overload into Intelligence Advantage

I will be speaking at Society of Competitive Intelligence Professionals’ 2006 International Annual Conference & Exhibition Thursday, April 27, 2:15 PM-3:15 PM in Orlando, with co-Presenter Richard Marrs of Coemergence, Inc. Attached is a brief article from a related talk at another conference last year (a longer white paper is in the works).

Description

Competitive intelligence professionals know they need to make their work more efficient and more effective in terms of both organizational strategy and bottom-line impact. But when it comes to the actual process of gathering and analyzing from disparate sources and signals--or getting the attention of executives when reporting results and recommendations--CI becomes a battle of information overload.

Rather than trying to eliminate overload, we suggest ways to embrace the richness of knowledge-intense collaborative environments. Converting a firehose of fragmentary information into actionable intelligence is really more about human culture and cognition than business technologies and organizational structures. The problem with structures and technologies to support rational analysis (including those used in CI) is that conscious, critical thinking accounts for only a small part of the human processes of sense-making and decision-making. In reality, decisions rely on the broader process of "cognition" (acquiring knowledge by the use of reasoning, intuition or perception) which is about awareness as much as it is about judgment.

In this session, you will learn through cutting-edge concepts on how to cultivate, stimulate and leverage all of your intellectual and information resources and networks for true competitive advantage.

Objectives

  • Understand the cognitive and cultural dynamics of sense- and decision-making; and why "information overload" is natural and even a strategic necessity.
  • Discover how to increase the bandwidth of available information for better awareness, analysis and actionable intelligence by leveraging existing characteristics and behaviors in your organization and networks.
  • Learn and practice proven techniques for generating bottom line impact through increased individual and collective operating effectiveness in signal rich environments.

Download information_overload_and_intelligence_defining_the_problem.pdf

Mar 15, 2006 9:42:56 AM | SenseMaking (cognition, learning, KM & CI)

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Steve

Steve Barth consults to international government, NGO, academic and corporate clients. Recent work has focused on organizational learning and KM strategies in economic development and peace and security. Award-winning writer specializing in organizational intelligence and knowledge worker productivity.

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