Skills of Knowledge and Information Managers – are curricula up-to-date (enough)?

Article type: Research Article

Authors: Blom, Dennis

Affiliations: Data Software Solutions BV, Director Product Technology & Chairman ISOC. NL, Diemerhof 24a, NL-1112 XN Diemen, The Netherlands. Tel.: +31 20 6608200; Fax: +31 20 6608229; E-mail: [email protected]

Abstract: Knowledge and Information: The blood of Society. Knowledge and Information is power:The main difference between a human being and an animal is the fact that humans can process information and create knowledge. Evolution of the human species has been from physical strength to better and superior K& I processing. Knowledge and Information: The raw material for production:Money is power and therefore Knowledge and Information is money. The raw material that modern companies are mining is hidden in the brains of their employees. This is something new for the industry and it seems normal to expect that the managers for these processes havenâĂŹt had a chance to get the necessary experience or education. Knowledge and Information: Creation without management:Knowledge is created by combining different pieces of information. This combination of different pieces of information itself is new information. For knowledge to be generated it is essential to have a base of information that can be combined into new information. Knowledge can be created best in a chaotic non-structured thinking process. Creativity cannot be structured and made more efficient. The biggest problem is probably that nobody knows what a good idea is until after it has become successful. Knowledge and Information: Mined only by proper management:The only way to become successful in mining K& I is to do this with proper management of the processes involved. On the one hand there is a danger of becoming too structured which will lead towards less creativity. On the other hand it is impossible to produce something reliable in a team of people if the process is not properly managed. Knowledge and Information: The future:It is my firm conviction that K& I will be similar to what steam was in the past. As Nicholas Negroponte once wrote: “We are moving from an atoms based society towards a bits based society”. In the future information processing will take a more dominant position. Physical processes will be of limited concern in the future.

DOI: 10.3233/ISU-1999-19102

Journal: Information Services & Use, vol. 19, no. 1, pp. 3-6, 1999