Information Professionals in the Corporate World
By Susanna Rogers Smith [15]
Many corporate organizations engage in information gathering practices, whether it is discerning what the consumer will purchase next month, sharing information between divisions or plants, or discovering what the competitor’s next merchandising scheme will be. These organizations also employ information professionals, sometimes in the traditional role of the librarian, and sometimes in other ways. It is the latter that this project will investigate in the hope that these corporate entities may have something to teach the intelligence community about gathering, storing and retrieving information. Corporations have their financial well‐being at stake, and this is often the impetus needed to combine cutting edge technology and human experience to create a new paradigm. Even the title “librarian” is being dropped in favor of terms like “knowledge manager” or “information specialist.” Regardless of the title, however, it is clear that business practices of some companies warrant a review by the intelligence community. By looking at some of their policies, new methods of information retrieval and management may come to light which may prove useful as the intelligence community struggles to adapt to the information age.
For example, the marketing research industry relies heavily on competitive intelligence to give their clients the data needed to make appropriate decisions. Nigel Culkin and David Smith, both business and marketing faculty at University of Hertfordshire and Jonathon Fletcher, Associate Director at DVL Smith Ltd, write the following: [T]here is also going to be a competitive advantage to those market research and information professionals who, at the outset of studies, can help define the problem in a manageable way, whilst at the end of the study helping the decision maker through the decision‐making process. This is done, in part, by listening carefully and factoring in the manager’s own intuition and prior knowledge on the subject, and also by helping set the information in a wider analytical framework context, together with helping the marketing decision maker present and win the case in the arena in which the argument must be presented.
By actively including information professionals in the entire process of the marketing study, they acknowledge the fact that the expertise information professionals bring is critical. An information framework is useless without the trained staff that can utilize the data effectively and turn it into useful intelligence.
Angela Cleaver, an information manager at Watson Wyatt LLP (a global consulting firm) has this to say about her position as an information professional: “At the end of the day we are able to contribute most to our organizations, whether we’re in pensions or pharmaceuticals, when we know our users and meet (and anticipate) their needs in the most appropriate way.” By relying on information professionals to do the jobs they were trained to do – research, information processing, cataloging and materials acquisition – this consulting firm continues to be successful even after 125 years of operation. This organization has the information professionals compile a daily news brief containing any items of interest to the company. In many ways, this report mirrors the President’s Daily Brief, which until 2005 was created by the analysts at the CIA and is now prepared by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. It would be interesting to see if by transferring this job to the information professionals two things would happen: the brief increases in usefulness and the analysts themselves have more time to devote to their area of specialty – creating intelligence. If this project’s recommendation were to be implemented, then information professionals imbedded in each analytic division could work together to create the Daily Brief. It is, at least, an interesting thought to consider.
A study by the Special Libraries Association determined that almost 60% of information professionals working in organizations other than libraries felt that they were being underutilized in the areas of research and almost half felt they could be useful in the areas of analysis and interpretation of information. Despite this, it is also clear from the SLA that the number of information professionals working in the area of “competitive intelligence” is growing, and the companies utilizing their services appear to be prospering, which is evident in the SLA statistics quoted earlier – 85% of the top Fortune 500 companies employ information professionals.
Assignments
1. Why do corporate organizations engage professionals in information gathering practices?
2. What functions does knowledge manager perform? Extend the figure 2.15.
3. What does the term ‘information specialist’ mean?
4. Is there a difference between librarians and information specialists?
5. What does the term ‘competitive intelligence’ mean?
6. Do you agree that information professionals are very important in the corporate world? Explain.
7. What is the main task of the information professionals in corporations?
8. Why does marketing research industry rely heavily on competitive intelligence?
9. In what cases is information framework useless?
10. Summarize the text.
Fig. 2.15 Functions of Knowledge Manager
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