A disciplined approach to enterprise knowledge

1
A disciplined approach to enterprise knowledge

• Michael Middleton
• For Institute of Information Management,
  Queensland
• Hilton Hotel, Brisbane
• 24 September 2003

2
Objectives

• Relationship of profession to discipline
• Pointers to developing the IM profession

3
Discipline?

• Branch of knowledge
• Coherent models and theories
• Discipline formation (academic tribes)

4
Discipline formation

• Establishing boundaries
• Classification

5
Discipline formation

• In general
• Philosophy
• Sociology
• Disciplinarians
• In information management
• The scholars
• The doers
• The synthesis
• unique in being defined in terms of what
  practitioners do rather than vice versa (Bottle,
  2003)

6
Professions

• The difference between a professional .. and a
  technician is that a technician knows everything
  about (the) job except its ultimate purpose and
  .. place in the scheme of things (Livingstone) 
• but
• All professions are conspiracies against the
  laity (Shaw)      

7
Professionalism (Flexner)

• Drawing on store of knowledge
• Distinction from technician
• Applying knowledge to human problems
• Improving knowledge through research
• Passing on the knowledge to novices
• Altruism

8
A profession

• Body of knowledge
• Underlying models/paradigms
• Standards
• Guidelines for application
• Responsibilities social and individual
• Guidelines for preparation

9
Body of knowledge

• Knowledge about information?
• Knowledge about enterprise knowledge?
• A textbook?
• Many of the operational aspects have texts
• Many of the analytical aspects have texts
• There are IS and business texts on strategic
  approaches
• A literature?
• Periodicals
• Standards
• White papers
• The Internet

10
Body of knowledge - Information management

• The information resource
• Applying information science?
• Articulating information management
• Horton, Cronin, Diener
• Case studies?
• Information management
• Knowledge management

11
Underlying models

• Communication models
• Information science
• Fundamentals
• Philosophy, mathematics, linguistics,
• Areas of study
• Nature of information Information design
• Information retrieval Information access
• Informetrics Information repositories
• Document analysis Information use behaviour
• Interface design Knowledge space
• Information migration

12
Underlying models - Information science

• Definitions of information
• Elements of information science
• What has information science done for the World?
• (Trudi Bellardo Hahn)

13
Standards - technical

• Examples
• Information repository
• Common Command Language
• ASCII
• Paper sizes
• SGML
• OSI
• QLD information standards IS40,41
• ISO, e.g. ISO15489
• ANSI
• EDIFACT
  
  
  

14
Management standards

• Quality standards
• Customer definition and service needs
• Performance measurement
• Process evaluation
• Continuous improvement action planning
• Internal
• Policy, e.g. forms

15
Guidelines for application

• Best practice
• Benchmarking
• Case studies

16
Responsibilities

• Social responsibilities
• Based on what defines a profession
• Develop and maintain body of knowledge
• Set and monitor standards of acceptable practice
• Prepare the incoming professionals, maintain
  continuing education
• Regulate guidelines for application and practice
• Educate the wider public
• Individual responsibilities
• Ethics

17
Ethics

• For example
• Honesty
• Competence
• Confidentiality
• Trust
• Respect for intellectual property
• Avoidance of conflict of interest
• Gatekeeping
• Stewardship . compliance

18
Preparation

• The curriculum
• ACMAISAITP IS2002
• IRMA DAMA

19
IS2002 Body of knowledge

• 2.8 Legal and Ethical Aspects of IS
• 2.9 Professionalism
• 2.10 Interpersonal Skills
• 3.0 Theory and Development of Systems
• 3.1 Systems and Information Concepts
• 3.2 Approaches to Systems Development (SD)
• 3.3 SD Concepts Methodologies
• 3.4 SD Tools and Techniques
• 3.5 Application Planning
• 3.6 Risk Management
• 3.7 Project Management
• 3.8 Information and Business Analysis
• 3.9 Information Systems Design
• 3.10 Systems Implementation Testing
• 3.11 Systems Operation and Maintenance
• 3.12 Systems Development for Specific Types of
  Information Systems

• 1.0 Information Technology
• 1.1 Computer Architectures
• 1.2 Algorithms and Data Structures
• 1.3 Programming Languages
• 1.4 Operating Systems
• 1.5 Telecommunications
• 1.6 Database
• 1.7 Artificial Intelligence
• 2.0 Organizational and Management Concepts
• 2.1 General Organization Theory
• 2.2 Information Systems Management
• 2.3 Decision Theory
• 2.4 Organizational Behavior
• 2.7 Managing the Process of Change

20
IRMA/DAMA model curriculum
21
Information professions

• Systems creation and maintenance
• Conversion to machine requirements
• Storytellers
• Economic reporters
• Collectors and Organisers
• Historical and organisational records
• Cultural objects
• Facilitators of published material
• Model builders

22
THE INFORMATION PROFESSIONAL

• An Information Professional may be
  differentiated from other professionals who may
  also work with data by the fact that s/he is
  concerned with content (the meaning applied to
  symbols) and therefore with the cognitive and
  intellectual operations performed on the data and
  information by a primary user......Debons, 1980
• versus
• An intermediary who works between the primary
• user and the data and information sources
  helping
• the user to reach an informed state.

23
Applications

• International information professions education
  role
• Information Resources Management Association
• Aslib the Association for Information Management
• Society for Technical Communication
• ARMA International
• Association for Computing Machinery
• Association for Information Systems
• Data Administration Management Association
• International Federation of Library Associations
  and Institutions
• National
• ASA/RMAA/AALIA/ACS

24
Whats in a name?

• The information architect brouhaha
• The information professional tug owar
• The knowledge management non sequitur

25
and . ?

• Body of knowledge?
• Underlying models/paradigms?
• Standards?
• Guidelines for application?
• Responsibilities social and individual?
• Guidelines for preparation?

26
Three laws of nonsense

• The source of nonsense is that for every piece of
  nonsense there exists an irrelevant frame of
  reference in which the item is sensible
• The persistence of nonsense comes from rigorous
  arguments from inapplicable assumptions
• The diffusion of nonsense results from the fact
  that people are more specialist than problems.