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Dealing_with_Information_Overload
| Dealing with Information Overload
Article Title: Dealing with Information Overload Author:
Stephan Szugat Word Count: 828 Article URL:
http://www.abenetis.com/encyclopedia.html Format: 65 Characters
per Line
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Dealing with Information Overload Today the sources of
information seem to be endless. Magazines, journals, memos,
emails, web sites and a lot more, provide us with more data than
any person is able to handle. Furthermore, information presented
to us while taking part at meetings and other events will join
the already obtained information from the above mentioned
sources. Information overload is a very real concern for today's
business people, but also for all others.
We must possess skills that allow us to process huge amounts of
data. Consider the following method as one option to bring your
information flow under your control.
1. Have a structure for the information you like to store.
Without a structure you will lose overview about which
information is stored where. A good solution for the beginning
is a structure of your own knowledge and information
requirements. For example: Make some folders or directories on
your computer. One directory or folder for one knowledge area,
such as languages, computer knowledge, knowledge from your
working experiences.
You could use your computer to store things you receive by email
or internet searches. To store offline items just follow the
same tactic. You might create one or more folders as you need to
keep your structure work. What ever you do, keep your structure
topic oriented. Open only new topics when you have many items
for the new ones. It works fine if you have a folder where you
store things first for which you don't have a folder yet. Just
call that folder 'Collected Items without Category' or something
similar.
2. Scan Articles before reading. When you encounter information
of interest, read the first paragraph or two, scan the body for
keywords and read the conclusion. Then decide if you want to
keep the article for future "in depth" reading. Store the
articles in a folder or directory which states that you like to
read this article in full length. Furthermore you could have
collecting folders where you put all information, which you
couldn't allocate to a specific area of knowledge. Learning to
"preview" information before deciding to spend valuable time on
it will save you many hours. Time to spend on the things that
matter most.
2. Managing Emails Today it's easy to receive 200 or more emails
each day. It's often difficult to determine which are important
and which are not. To save time sorting the emails, simply
filter the important emails into separate folders. Then once a
day look at the rest. Use your email programs filtering
capabilities to accomplish this. Just setup some rules to sort
received emails into some folders.
Or use a spam filter. However, none of the programs available
today work 100% correct. You have to bear in mind, that the spam
filter might delete some important messages. Well, my experience
is, that if you use a filtering system you will probably clean
up your Inbox as good as if you use a spam filtering software.
But the advantage is, you won't miss important emails.
What ever system you use, a filter in your email program, or a
third-party spam filtering product, controlling unwanted emails
is a must. And if even that is not working anymore, setup a new
email address and share this one just with the people very
important to you. This will reduce the flood of spam mails for a
while.
3. Set aside "in depth" reading time. Asign times for the in
depth reading of articles and other information. At these times
you could read your articles and do further researches. While
reading articles, you could also do the review which is
mentioned in the next paragraph.
4. Review stored information regularly Information has a short
life. It is essential to review the information you store
regular, to keep the information actual. All old and no more
usefull information must be deleted or thrown away. If you don't
review regular, you will see your folders mess up and your
computer harddrive will get very full. No kidding, soon you will
have thousands of files. When reviewing remember to review also
the bookmark in your favorite web-browser. You may save it for
later reference. A review should be made at last every 6 month,
at least once a year if the information is for private use.
Business owner should review every 3 to 6 month.
Conclusion It needs a structure and discipline to handle the
information overload we all are facing every day. If you don't
follow your own rules for Information Management, you will be
losing the information game one day.
To win the information game has little to do with time
management, it's an issue of self organisation and discipline.
While implementing and using the above described solution you
will see that things are changing to be more comfortabel for
you. You might also find out that the life of information is not
really that short as most people think. Good Luck.
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About the author:
About the Author: Stephan Szugat is founder of abenetis a
web-based service about Business Management Solutions focusing
on the core needs of business management. He has approx. 15
years experience in the Finance and Accounting Area from
companies of different size and from various industries. http://www.abenetis.com
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