The Information Age and the Role of the "Knowledge Worker"

For knowledge professionals in the 21st century, "It's not what you know, but who you know" and "High-Tech, High-Touch" might be their mottos.

Networking and human contact have never been more accessible, broad, widespread, and, conversely, more challenging than they are now.

This unprecedented ease with which individuals and information may now be accessed is only possible because of the advent of the information era. This has been made possible by the same technology that has decreased the duration between communications from weeks to seconds.

Networking and personal connections are based on the fact that there is no designated time for communication. People no longer have the luxury of the time they once had to deliberate and construct their words and interactions. As the amount of communication has increased, so too has the amount of "noise," as I like to call it. Noise, defined as communications with content that is either ineffective or completely useless, is defined as "noise."

There is a lot of talk about new types of workplace organizations that rely heavily on the backing of the institution on which they are based.

It used to be termed "self interest," but today it is renamed "communities of interest," "expert groups," "learning communities," "quality circles," "virtual teams," and communities of practice.

Participants who are "picked" by their senior management colleagues to join groups that get official encouragement and institutional backing are typically not just unsuccessful, but actively resentful.

Resentment may stem from the fact that a person can not choose the individuals with whom he or she wants to connect; rather, management makes this decision for them. It's common to see: evaluations of whether a particular person is the right fit for any given discussion or topic; no icebreaker exercises to break down interpersonal barriers to communication; and no attempt to understand or rationalize each individual's differing political agendas that he/she has been sent to present to the meeting by his/her administrative superiors are all missing from the meeting.

The way these organizations are organized and handled is a major obstacle to their success. If you're a manager who sets up these groups, you're probably not aware of this fact. It's typically because you've read some literature and scanned the content, discovered a decent concept, and then launched your next management "fad."

To put this into perspective, it's noteworthy to note that organizations that self-create and self-moderate without including a management layer perform very well and accomplish a great deal. Although the group's original purpose has been met, the group still struggles to come up with a new "raison d'être" to continue because they value the interactions, mutual support, and "tick-tack" discussions that add value to each person's understanding by leveraging their understanding and/or perceptions of the other members. Groups typically find themselves "swirling" when this strategy fails. People leave and keep in touch with one another in case a new purpose for getting together arises. When this happens, more people from that first group join in, bringing their unique skills and interests to bear as well.

The work that goes on behind-the-scenes to remain in touch and assist each other is intense, covert, and seldom reflected in conventional reporting structures or performance reporting systems. At the very least, a third of a typical workday is required. A well-kept secret utilized by the majority of employees is how it is accounted for in data entered into tool suites intended to document work on financed projects.

Their imaginative and practical ideas are possibly the most valuable type of intelligence that these organizations can provide.Due to their perception that it comes from "feral" sections inside the organization, top management has a major reluctance to accept and examine the information. A common theory among office cynics is that upper management is angry that they cannot take credit for the effort since they were unaware of it. "Feral" behavior is rewarded and even funded by several corporations across the globe. The 'thief of the year' award, for example, has been established by one firm. It is granted to the individual who is able to locate anything in the public domain that he or she can subsequently use to significantly boost the company's bottom line. The same company pays its employees to work off-line on the development of a new product concept for six months.They are compensated if they succeed, and the firm benefits from their efforts. If they don't succeed, they'll be fired or, at the very least, put in positions where they'll be severely restricted in their freedom for an extended length of time. An intrapreneur is frequently put to the test before deciding to try out a concept, and this raises the pressure on him or her to succeed after the decision has been made.

Organizational change manifests itself in a variety of ways, such as a reduction in staff or a merger or acquisition of two or more organizations. This results in workers having difficulty finding labor or information from established role-based structures in their organizations because of the constant redrawing of internal boundaries, responsibilities, and organizational charts. Workers use their own personal networks rather than depend on unstable and eroding organizational charts in these situations. Worker empowerment can only come through establishing and sustaining a personal social network. Workflow diagrams and performance assessments don't take into account the effort of networking, which is referred to as "invisible."

Prior to the advent of today's "communities of practice," workers spent significant amounts of time honing their skills in small groups. "Communities of practice have been extensively studied, and researchers have identified a number of fundamental features of this kind of labor. Because of their familiarity with one another as well as a wealth of social, cultural, and organizational expertise, employees could focus on their job without worrying about their personal lives interfering with their productivity. Workers were usually (but not always) housed together, which allowed for more frequent one-on-one interactions that aided in the sharing of information and the efficient completion of duties. " It has been found that [Kraut et al., 1993; Whittaker et al., 1994; Nardi and Engeström, 1999] Author: -- Quoted in "It's Not What You Know, It's Who You Know: Work in the Information Age." Bonnie A. Nardi, Steve Whittaker, and Heinrich Schwarz, 2001, www.firstmonday.dk

According to recent management literature, these working circumstances are gradually becoming outmoded. It is a result of these organizational and technological advancements that activities are increasingly 'distributed' inside many corporations and organizations, i.e., where the employees may be dispersed around the organization and even worldwide. Stresses such as these are common in this kind of workplace. Knowing who is in the network, being aware of what others in the network are doing, and knowing where they are, as well as having a variety of media options from which to choose when communicating with others, are all essential. Keeping in touch with people who may be of service in the future is a good idea.

There is a strong emphasis in management literature on team-based approaches to work place organization, in contrast to the personal network concept. According to what I've read, it's generally assumed that people do their jobs in groups with well-defined roles and duties. In a similar vein, the idea that organizations have predictable, stable structures is widely accepted.

A big Commonwealth organization has found that both of these assumptions are incorrect. Different studies indicate comparable attitudes in many other bureaucracies, for example: Fisher and Fisher, 1998; Lloyd and Boyle, 1998; Jarvenapaa and Leidner, 1999; Mark, Grudin, and Poltrock, 1999.

In this brief overview, what is being suggested is that management groups re-appraise their directions and consider whether their official structures are delivering the outcomes which were predicted and/or imagined and then explore whether the vitality of unleashing and supporting underground, feral or more "neural" networks offers a better direction.