information overload.pdf

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In Company Upper intermediate Resource materials

7 Information overload

Chris Murray

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1 How many of the following types of information/communication does a typical office worker

have to deal with daily? Discuss with a partner.

a phone calls ______

e inter-office memos ______

b e-mails

______

f faxes

______

c voicemails ______

g mobile phone calls ______

d items of post ______

2 Read the first paragraph of the text and find the answers to 1. Do any of them surprise you? Then

read the rest of the text. Which of the points in the text are most relevant to you. Discuss with a partner.

Another day in the office, which, according to one

recent study, consists of handling 46 phone calls,

25 e-mails, 16 voicemails, 23 items of post, eight

inter-office memos, 16 faxes and nine mobile

phone calls.

Les Posen, a psychologist who has written

numerous articles on technology and psychology,

says information overload can lead to people

losing control of what material is important and

what isn’t. ‘Our filtering systems get overloaded,

so the good stuff gets left out as much as the

useless stuff, and we might find ourselves not able

to easily differentiate between quality material

and non-quality material,’ he says.

Enough to send you crazy? You may be right.

Gerry McGovern, who is writing a book on

information overload, is in no doubt the huge

quantity of information has led to increasing stress

levels and results in a downturn in productivity.

‘Someone who spends hours sorting e-mails and

getting distracted by unimportant details may be

suffering from information overload,’ Posen adds.

Other signs include switching off completely. He

says the key to avoiding information overload is to

find a middle ground that recognises the

importance of technology to our working and

social lives while ensuring it doesn’t eat up all our

time.

‘I think that, to some degree, long-term or

medium-term strategic thinking is being restricted

by the necessity to react to the continual

bombardment of short-term data,’ he says. ‘A lot

of managers are spending so much of their time

coping with the data that’s coming through today

that they don’t have as much time as they should

to properly analyse it and put it in perspective.’

3 Gerry McGovern put forward a list of six skills for dealing with information overload. Rank the skills according

to their degree of effectiveness (1 = most effective). Compare your ranking with the rest of your group/class.

Six skills to avoid information overload

Learn to think better. More decisions aren’t necessarily better decisions. You might make

better decisions if you make fewer decisions.

Learn to plan better. Don’t simply react to short-term data. Make sure you are also thinking

about the medium and long term.

Learn to research better. Be thorough about what you do. According to a survey conducted

last year, only one in 20 people will scroll to the second page of search results.

Learn to organise better. Nurture the architect in you.

Learn to collaborate better. Work towards common goals. McGovern quotes author Frances

Cairncross from his book The Company of the Future : ‘The most widespread revolution in the

workplace will come from the rise in collaboration and the decline of hierarchy.’

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Learn to network better. People are the network.

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