Gartner: All Organizations have Information Chaos

Gartner Managing VP Hanns Köhler-Krüner, spoke at the Intelligent Information Management Summit 2018 event in September and his message centered around information chaos and the problems that chaos causes within organizations. At the event, Gartner’s Information Management Specialist featured facts that were a real eye-opener for many organizations. Köhler-Krüner’s message was clear:

Every organization is burdened with information management problems which causes extra work and a considerable reduction in labor productivity.

Köhler-Krüner alluded to a recent study by Gartner, where the results showed that organizations have six information repositories, on average. He mentioned that, at the onset of the research, it became clear that all organizations suffer from some degree of information chaos, which causes drastic inefficiencies within organizations. He laid out some of the resulting inefficiencies owed to this chaos:

• Employees need to master information management in a wide variety of esoteric systems and data warehouses.

• Often, no one knows exactly what’s in these systems.

• Finding information takes time, resulting in decreased productivity.

• The use of multiple systems involves data protection risks.

During his speech, Köhler-Krüner also said that only through intelligent information management and digitalization are modern working methods possible — partly because, in the not-so-distant future, work will increasingly be done remotely off-site with information management tools that provide the same experience remotely as if the employee were at the office. That’s one way intelligent information management demonstrates tremendous value — when information is readily available, regardless of where the worker is and which device they utilize.

Information Management has a Huge Impact on Productivity

Köhler-Krüner also stressed that information management affects all members of an organization, regardless of where they are. He described the effects of intelligent information management on productivity and the resulting consequences on employee morale and motivation. Köhler-Krüner said that, according to the Gartner study, up to 70% of workers will only do exactly what is asked of them. If the organization does not exploit intelligent information management, brilliant ideas and development proposals will be lost in the data gap, uncaptured without being processed. And this can reduce employee motivation. Köhler-Krüner stated that employees are committed when they feel that their work is valued in the organization — and intelligent information management can help capture ideas and increase employee engagement.

With intelligent information management, the introduction of new employees or participants to a project is quick and efficient. When all information is quickly and easily available for a job or project, things progress more efficiently. Data sharing is no longer spread across spreadsheets and endless email strings.

The speech was, in many ways, thought-provoking. His keynote had audience members considering:

• How many data silos do we have in our organization?

• Which information is in which repository?

• How do we get information from them and how fast?

The answers to these questions tell a story — a snapshot of an organization’s information management situation. A simple assessment that can help define what’s next in that organization’s information management evolution.

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