Chapter5 bryant
- 1. Chapter 5 Information and the CIO Antony Bryant ABSTRACT As the chapters by Black and Brunt make clear, the role of the information officer or its equivalent emerged and developed at least from the late 19th century; both in the commercial world and in government, particularly what we would now term ‘the intelligence services’. Moreover, many of the key activities and responsibili- ties have a far longer history, in many respects dating all the way back to the establishment of the libraries of the ancient world. The core around which all these activities and responsibilities revolve is that of ‘information management’, and the person charged with overall command and control of this domain came to be termed the ‘Chief Information Officer’ (CIO) in the last years of the 20th century. The terms ‘CIO’ and ‘information management’ are of recent coinage; but their focus and core characteristics have a far longer, more complex, and ambivalent status as will be demonstrated in this chapter. The Tangled Roots of the ‘Information Age’ Black and Brunt rightly draw our attention to key developments which led to the identification and specific allocation of information management roles and respon- sibilities, and Black in particular has been at the forefront of those arguing that if there is an ‘information age’ or ‘information society’, then its roots lie in the 19th rather than the 20th century. (Black, Muddiman, & Plant, 2007; Black, 2001; Weller & Bawden, 2005, 2006). Yet the 20th century certainly marks the beginning of an information era in some senses. Previously seen largely in peripheral terms, information — and its conjoined concept ‘communication’ — took on a far more central and influential role as the century progressed. By the 1940s and 1950s Barnard (1938/1972) was stressing the communicational aspects of organizations, Simon (1947) and March and Simon (1958) was focusing on the ways in which information and decision making were related, and the first computer-based information systems were being introduced Information Management: Setting the Scene Copyright r 2007 by Elsevier Ltd. All rights of reproduction in any form reserved. ISBN: 978-0-08-046326-1
- 2. 58 Antony Bryant into commercial organizations (the first being LEO in the UK — see Ferry, 2003). Recognition of the role of information in social systems, including the market, or- ganizational development, and institutions in general was developing — albeit only slowly. Thus the 2001 Nobel Prize for economics was awarded to Akerlof, Spence, and Stiglitz for their work on asymmetric information and the role of information in markets; work largely completed and published in the 1960s and 1970s (see the announcement of the prize — Nobel Prize, 2001). Influential models of the 1970s, such as Porter’s value chain, were revised and amended by the early 1990s (e.g., Rayport & Sviokla, 1994, 1995) to take account of the many intangible but highly influential factors often ignored up until then, particularly those centring on information, communication, and social interaction. Information was thus taking centre stage by 1990, particularly in connection with information and communications technology (ICT); dramatically altering the ways in which people conceived of markets, transaction costs, business models, and organizational design. Moreover, companies were changing their top-level manage- ment structure so that IS specialists were included at board level, usually with a title such as ‘IS Director’; but by the late 1990s the post of CIO was becoming fairly common, although what it actually entailed differed markedly from one organization to the next, and sometimes within one organization from one incumbent to the next. On the other hand, many of the wilder claims made by information and ICT publicists — the consultants of spin — gradually turned out to be no more than vainglorious wishful thinking, with little or no foundation in organizational or social reality. The information age was not going to usher in a new era of riches for all; the misty-eyed optimism of the dotcom boom of the 1990s was soon exposed by the harsh economic realities of the dotcom bust. The info-utopians included Daniel Bell, Chris Evans, Alvin Toffler, and Peter Drucker (see Bell, 1976; Drucker, 1994; Evans, 1979; Toffler, 1970; Webster, 2004) — i.e., sociologists, IT specialists, futurologists, and management gurus. Many of these excessive claims were and continue to be anchored in a failure to understand the complexities of the socio-economic context of the late 20th and early 21st centuries, founded upon a misconception about the nature of information and communication. Black and Brunt offer a historical context against which to develop a consideration of information management and the role of the CIO, to which a clearer conceptual framework needs to be added. The main purpose of this chapter is to address some of the key misconceptions about information, since these relate directly to the topic of the role of the CIO, thereby complementing the other two chapters in this section. (Those interested in the wider issues can start by consulting Bryant, 2006.) The information management literature has not been silent on these matters, but in many regards the ramifications of several key critiques have not been taken on board, either in the curriculum or in practice. Information MISconceptions As early as 1967 Russell Ackoff was pointing out what he saw as five crucial mis- conceptions about Management Information Systems (MIS), themselves heralded as
- 3. Information and the CIO 59 the key to organizational survival and success at the time. The misconceptions identi- fied by Ackoff (1967) were: – Managers do not lack information, they struggle with excess. – Managers ask for more information than they need, and designers supply more than is requested. – Decision making does not necessarily improve with more information. – Performance is not necessarily enhanced by better communication. – Managers must understand more about information systems. These mostly emanate from a more-is-better view of information, with information seen as a resource much like any other material input to organizational operation and output. Another aspect of the misconception of information was presented in a paper by Feldman and March (1981) published in 1981. Here they pointed out that any idea that information served simply as a formal and potentially optimizable input to rational decision making was grossly mistaken. In organizational settings informa- tion is not simply gathered with a particular aim in mind, and even if it was the original intention, it is often not used for that purpose. Thus information gathered in response to specific requirements is often not even considered for the purpose for which it was requested. Information used to justify a decision is often collected and used after the decision has been made. Regardless of the information available, more is always requested; while there will be simultaneous disregarding of the information already to hand. In contrast to this Feldman and March pointed out that there is a key distinction between what they termed ‘actual human behaviour and apparently optimal information behaviour’ (p. 171). Whereas the latter is anchored in an engi- neering model, the former must contend with social beings acting in organizational and social contexts. Thus Feldman and March were at pains to point out that from this latter perspective, information behaviour is far less oriented towards rational decision making, and far more concerned with coping with uncertainty and social interaction. As a consequence they stressed a range of reasons for organizational investment in information, including surveillance, learning and environmental scan- ning, and what they term symbolizing a ‘commitment to rational choice’; hence the distinction they offer between information is ‘signal’ and ‘symbol’. Writing in the early 1980s, Feldman and March were not arguing for new information strategies as such; their focus was on actual behaviours, and the ways in which strategies, rules, and procedures actually embody the full richness of organi- zational use of information, even if the formally stated objectives only reflect a limi- ted and somewhat misconceived view of such activities. In effect they were outlining an anthropological orientation towards understanding and guiding information activities in organizations, setting it in contrast to mechanistic engineering-type models. This became even more critical in the last decades of the 20th century as these activities became more critical to organizational development and survival. Ackoff, writing from the systems perspective, and Feldman and March, writing perhaps unwittingly from something akin to an anthropological one, were laying the foundation for a far more profound understanding of information systems. Yet the
- 4. 60 Antony Bryant predominant view at this time largely ignored this, favouring a computer-centred orientation. Ackoff stressed the need for managers to understand more about in- formation systems, but this was unlikely to happen if the specialists, IS professionals, themselves were often equally lacking in insight. In many regards this was not too surprising given the rapid developments in computer and communications technology during this period. ICT for a time did indeed appear to be the solution to all problems; but now we know better or at least we know that we are in a far more complex context not amenable to simple ICT- based ‘solutions’. Yet in many organizations the role of the CIO still seems wedded to this misconceived view. Thus the role of the CIO is seen in techno-centric terms as a resource manager or engineer, ensuring efficient and effective information and ICT use in a context of rational decision making and technical communication. In part this is because work emanating from Ackoff, Feldman and March, and others has not been taken into account — all too often being effaced by the largely unfounded claims being made for the latest ICT advances in products and services. This is not easily remedied, but the re-opening of the historical development of organizational use of information as demonstrated by Black and Brunt, together with a revised conception of information itself may help in this endeavour. Feldman and March hint at some aspects of this when they introduce the distinction between ‘actual behaviour’ and ‘engineering models’, and also in their choice of the terms ‘signal’ and ‘symbol’, similarly indicated by Ackoff in his implicit critique of information as a resource. Both arguments can be seen as exposing the limitations of an engineering model of information and communication; a model that retains significant influence in university curricula, business models, organizational design, management practices, and the IS profession. The model encompasses, and probably emanates from, two key assumptions, both crucially incorrect: – Information is something refined from data, essentially a raw material; – Communication is accomplished through the movement of information, in a fluid- like manner, from (active) sender to (passive) receiver. If both of these assumptions were valid then the role of the CIO would be akin to a combination of a fluid mechanic and a specialist in hydraulics, transposed to a context of computers and communications technology. But neither one is correct, and so in order to establish the basis for understanding the role of the CIO — before or after the advent of the computer — each must be displaced or remedied. Data and Information The first assumption, that information is somehow the result of refining data, is found in many if not most standard texts on topics such as databases, data mana- gement, information systems, software engineering, and the like. (A number of exa- mples are listed in Bryant, 2006, pp. 54–55.) It has been termed the ‘chemical engineering metaphor’, raw data being turned into refined information in a manner similar to that which results in petroleum being produced from crude oil. Most likely
- 5. Information and the CIO 61 it arises from the attribution of computer-like processes to humans; something at least as common as the converse and just as erroneous (think of artificial intelli- gence). The examples in the literature are as likely to locate the processing within computers as they are to associate the processing within humans; but it is the latter that is the more pernicious and in need of rectification for our present purposes. The fault can be termed praxeomorphism, the ascription of technological features and facilities to human beings; as opposed to anthropomorphism, the incorrect attribu- tion of human characteristics to the non-human — both animate and inanimate. Computers do indeed process data in the sense that the machines perform various operations, but the processes and the processors are themselves devoid of meaning. Humans cannot do this. People cannot engage directly with anything to do with data, as soon as they pay any attention to anything we are in the realm of meaning. Scanning a book into a computer is a data process; someone trying to read it — and make sense of it — immediately is in the realm of information because it inevitably involves meaning. If there is any sense in which humans engage with data then it is the sense in which we all constantly buy books, download documents, collect papers; failing to read any of them. In this sense they are data, since we have failed to attend to them. If later we pick up and open the book, or read the paper, then we are immediately and ineluctably in the realm of meaning. But to characterize this as a process of transformation is both incorrect and highly misleading. Nothing has been transformed — the book or paper is the same as it was previously. Human beings are intrinsically and inherently information-oriented; silicon-based ones are data- oriented, the efforts of the artificial intelligence brigade notwithstanding. As a consequence the role of the CIO should involve negotiating the ways in which humans use and manage information in a context in which ICT has come to play a significant role — in some ways clarifying the earlier forms of information manage- ment as outlined by Black and Brunt, and in other regards doing this very differently as a consequence of these technological advances, as will be explained in the later sections of this chapter. Information and Communication This misconception of the nature of data and its putative relationship with information is to some extent sustained and developed in the second aspect centring on information and communication. The basis for this pervasive misconception can be found in the pioneering work of Shannon and his colleagues in the early decades of the 20th century. Shannon’s work in Bell Laboratories starting in the 1940s resulted in what is now recognized as the mathematical theory of communication, and also provided the basis of information theory (see Shannon, 1948; Shannon & Weaver, 1959). The diagrammatic form at the heart of this work is shown in Figure 5.1, and might appear to be non-controversial. The labelling of the boxes is perfectly acceptable, but the arrows are more problematic, specifically those labelled ‘Message’ and ‘Received Message’. While there is no doubt that signals are passed between transmitter and receiver, through a medium of some kind — the channel — such assurance is
- 6. 62 Antony Bryant SOURCE DESTINATION Noise Source Message Received Message TRANSMITTER CHANNEL RECEIVER Signal Received Signal Figure 5.1: Shannon’s model of communication. misplaced for the preceding and succeeding operations. The underlying assumption for the model as a whole is that communication operates as a form of hydraulics, with information flowing from sender to receiver through channels or conduits: The sender despatching the message which eventually arrives at its designated destination. An everyday example — at least before the advent or email — would be posting a letter. The letter is put in the envelope, posted, collected, sorted, transported, and finally delivered to the designated address: A model of communication, but one that entirely ignores the actual writing of the letter and the reading of it at the other end; also disregarding any of the context, motivations, and assumptions underlying these actions. As such it exemplifies what Michael Reddy has termed ‘the conduit metaphor’ for communication, a trope particularly prevalent in the English language. Reddy argues that this metaphor evokes images of waterways, channels, ducts, pipes, streams etc. Reddy characterizes what he terms the four categories that constitute the critical features of the conduit metaphor (1) language functions like a conduit, transferring thoughts bodily from one person to another; (2) in writing and speaking, people insert their thoughts or feelings in the words; (3) words accomplish the transfer by containing the thoughts or feelings and conveying them to others; and (4) in listening or reading, people extract the thoughts and feelings once again from the words (Reddy, 1993, p. 170). He illustrates this in many ways, e.g., with regard to the question — ‘What do speakers of English say when communication fails or goes astray?’ (1993, p. 166) His examples include the following: – Try to get your thoughts across better – None of Mary’s feelings came through to me with any clarity – You still haven’t given me any idea of what you mean
- 7. Information and the CIO 63 From these and other detailed examples the imagery is stark and clear, informa- tion is something to be despatched, transported, delivered, and received; under- standing, interpretation, and the like are barely perceptible if at all. The conduit model (a metaphor is a model) is misleading; partial at best, and crucially miscon- ceived in general. Simultaneously it is highly influential, largely at the level of implicit ideas and assumptions operating at the metaphorical level. Reddy’s ‘conduit’ operates in a fashion similar to Shannon’s ‘channel’; yet if Reddy’s argument is valid, then Shannon’s model must be flawed. In fact Shannon came to regret the way in which he had presented his model. He was adamant from the outset that his model precluded meaning, being solely focused on the ways in which signals were transmitted and then used as the basis for selection of which possible series of symbols matched the set of symbols that had actually been received. As such the argument that the model is an adequate one for characterizing delivery, but not for any semantic, social or human aspects of communication, is correct. Indeed Shannon tried to revise his model, seeking to replace the term ‘information’ with ‘entropy’; but he failed to do so as the latter term was so difficult for people to understand — his exact phrase was that the concept of entropy ‘is too difficult to communicate’ (stress added). Unfortunately he did not consider the possibility that the misunderstanding engendered by his model itself might prove to be so pernicious and difficult to eradicate. The situation is that people’s understanding of information and communication rests on a doubly misconceived foundation: – Information is seen as processed data, with people performing the processing in a fashion similar to that done by computers; – Communication is seen as a form of transfer, with the receiver in a completely passive role. These misconceptions have been exacerbated with the advent of ICT. In some regards they predate these technologies, but in others they have developed in con- cert with them. The conduit-type imagery in English existed well before the 20th century, although discussion of communication has altered significantly with the advent of the telephone, TV, and ICT. Everyday use of the term data, however, is far more closely bound up with the development of the computer. The danger is that on such bases the role of information management in general and the CIO in particular come to be understood, and put into practice; also having influence far beyond this domain. That this is indeed happening is attested to by many of the current texts on information management, websites, and journals devoted to the role of the CIO, and many other examples of ‘best practice’ and ‘core competen- cies’ around ideas such as ‘knowledge transfer’, ‘e-learning’, ‘learning outcomes’, and ‘information architectures’. This is not to disparage some aspects of these, but it is to underline their limitations and anchoring in the two key misconceptions outlined above.
- 8. 64 Antony Bryant The Role of the CIO: Mechanist or Cultivator? There are various ways in which this situation can begin to be rectified. The work of Maes (1999) in recent years has demonstrated the extent to which information management has to be distinguished from IT management, and this forms the back- ground for many of the contributions to this volume. Reddy’s endeavours to high- light the ubiquity and deficiencies of the conduit metaphor, point to the crucial ambiguities in the ways in which Shannon’s model has been generalized for all forms and aspects of communication. Ideas such as ‘alignment’, ‘transfer’, ‘processing’, and so on are attractive because they suggest problems and issues that are amenable to relatively simple, mechanistic solutions. Unfortunately the really existing problems arising from information management, the development of ICT, and the like, are more complex, and require more insightful approaches. In the light of this the role of the CIO is to ensure that an organization’s infor- mation system is one centred on meaning and sharing; along the lines of Maes’ model. Black and Brunt’s historical work helps us to understand this in a broader context, as well as to appreciate the changes wrought by general social developments as well as those specifically related to ICT. Consideration of this broader historical scenario allows us to understand what is core to the management of information, and what is not; in much the same way as Brooks distinguished between the ‘essential’ and the ‘accidental’ in software development. In many cases technological advances often occur at such a pace, and across such a wide range of application that an appreciation of these distinctions is only possible at a later stage. Writing in the 1970s Raymond Williams (1974) argued that it was only then, some 40 years or more after its first appearance, that people could begin to grasp the true impact and potential of television; an observation largely premised on the assumption that the technology would not develop much further. In the case of ICT, the emergence of the technology only occurred comparatively recently, but it has continued to develop and gone through several transformations since its appearance. In much the same fashion, information management needs to be re-evaluated in the light of the impact of ICT: With the technology understood to have had a transformative effect which alters some of the earlier ideas about information mana- gement and the role of the CIO or its equivalent, but also having the consequence of enhancing our understanding of the core continuities between information manage- ment before and after the emergence of ICT as it exists in the first decade of the 21st century. This duality was hinted at by Beer (1981), writing in the 1970s as computer technology was starting to become a key factor in organizational contexts. His target was the technology of mainframe computers, but his ideas have an immediate rele- vance to all forms of ICT. His ideas are best summarized in a set of questions that he posed concerning the ways in which computer technology was being used and introduced in organizations: The question which asks how to use the computer in the enterprise, is, in short, the wrong question. A better formulation is to ask how the enterprise should be
- 9. Information and the CIO 65 run given that computers exist. The best version of all is the question asking, what, given computers, the enterprise now is. (stress in original) If this is applied to information management and the role of the CIO, then it should lead to our asking ‘what, given the existence of ICT in its current forms, the practice of information management and the role of the CIO now is?’ Are We All Information Managers Now? What Black and Brunt demonstrate is that to some extent people have always been practising information management whether they realized this or not; much as Monsieur Jourdain in Moliere’s Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme had been speaking prose all his life. The examples described by Black and Brunt show what happens as the scope, range, and variety of available and potentially relevant information increases beyond the capacity of a single individual — ‘a head-full’ — or that of a small group of closely interacting individuals. In particular they illustrate the various mechanisms used to manage and control information by a mix of new management tasks, emerging specialisms and skills, control and containment of the information, and various ways in which the information about the information could be processed and structured: Hence the work on indexing, cataloguing, establishing of company data repositories, information officers and so on, sometimes coupled with technologies such as Hollerith cards, index cards, protocols, and indexes. All of this was underway well before computers were anything more than an experimental technology aimed specifically at mathematical calculations. As Black and his colleagues have argued (Black et al., 2007) the information age if it exists in any form at all must be seen as originating from at least the late 19th century. This must be combined with recognition that the impact of computers and ICT in the 20th century was at least as much to do with demands from (pull) the social context as the potential offered by the technology itself (push). This view has been developed and endorsed by writers such as Beniger (1989), Berman (1989), and Ellul (1980), among many others. It has been perhaps most eloquently summarized by Weizenbaum (1984) who argued that the ‘remaking of the world in the image of the computer started long before there were any electronic computers’ (1984, p. ix). Berman makes a similar point: If the growth of capitalism based on hierarchy, controlled sequence and rapid iteration remade the world in the image of the computer, then the seemingly uncontrollable growth of corporate and state bureaucracy was the crisis that was averted by the computer’s appearance (1989, p. 23). Thus the tendencies highlighted by Black and Brunt were part of a wider trend of explosive information growth that accompanied the development of large-scale industrial economies. It was no coincidence that apart from being the person who built the first computer, Charles Babbage was a factory owner, specifically interested in the ways in which labour could be sub-divided and manufacturing operations
- 10. 66 Antony Bryant dismantled and then integrated to ensure a more efficient rate of production. In extending Adam Smith’s work he developed what is still referred to as the ‘Babbage Principle’ the master manufacturer, by dividing the work to be executed into different processes, each requiring different degrees of skill or force, can purchase exactly that precise quantity of both which is necessary for each process; whereas, if the whole work were executed by one workman, that person must possess sufficient skill to perform the most difficult, and sufficient strength to execute the most laborious, of the operations into which the art is divided (Babbage, 1832, pp. 175–176 — quoted by Berman, 1989, p. 12) The early information technology referred to by Black and Brunt was brought in to the service of organizational and manufacturing exigencies; but in so doing, the way was opened up for transformations and changes well beyond the imagination and control of Babbage and others of like mind. The initial ideas about harnessing ICT — even in the form of punched-cards, indexes, and the like — were probably anchored in Beer’s first question. This is borne out by the points made by Black and Brunt. Brunt offers examples from the intelligence context, such as MI5, which include the creation of a Central Registry, the development of indexes, and the appearance of characters who might be regarded as embryonic CIOs. Black also offers examples of people who might now be regarded as CIOs, or certainly as ‘information managers’, as well as highlighting the ways in which large, bureaucratic organizations such as the Bank of England had to restructure their information services in a far more overt and mechanized fashion in the early part of the 20th century. What both exemplify are the ways in which the technology initially takes on the terms and characteristics of the surroundings. Organizations have long been seen in terms of either organisms or mechanisms — sometimes both simultaneously. What is not always so obvious is the way in which early computer technology was seen in terms of organizational hierarchies and divisions. For instance, Brunt makes extensive mention of the Central Registry as the core of the emerging information function — acting as a control and monitoring mechanism as well as a record keep- ing one. Black makes similar allusions to the central mechanization department. In many regards the CPU took on precisely this role in computer architecture, and the most common use of the term ‘registry’ now refers to the database at the heart of the Windows operating system: Similarly the transformation in the meaning of terms such as ‘file’, ‘desktop’, ‘editor’, and ‘printer’. What the chapters and sources offered by Black and Brunt also indicate is that the early use of information technology was largely at the level of Beer’s first question — i.e., ‘how can we use this technology as part of our existing practices?’ Yet what rapidly happens is that, if people do not pose Beer’s second and third questions for themselves, then the context soon forces a confrontation with just such challenges. Brunt points to the ways in which the use of some information management type technologies in the intelligence community led to them mimicking, and eventually learning from and enhancing, the practices of librarians and professional indexers. Black shows even more clearly the ways in
- 11. Information and the CIO 67 which the emergence of information officers or their like led to new domains of responsibility, associated demarcation disputes, claims for professional status and recognition, and a host of other unintended consequences of organizational adoption of technologies and mechanization in general. Whether they wished to or not, organizations had to face the question — ‘Given this technology; what is the nature of our enterprise?’ In The Adventure of the Sussex Vampire, Sherlock Holmes receives a letter from a correspondent asking him to investigate a case that seems to involve a vampire roaming the countryside in Southern England. Holmes is sceptical, but his attention is sufficiently engaged for him to ask Dr Watson to ‘Make a long arm y and see what V has to say’ — i.e., Watson should stretch across to the shelf holding the set of reference books, presumably with a volume for each letter of the alphabet. (Conan Doyle, 1924) Reading this story in the early 21st century, there are several remark- able aspects that would not have been noteworthy at the time it was written. Why does someone as intelligent and incisive as the great Sherlock Holmes need to use a reference book to find out (more) about vampires? In other stories we are told that he is an expert on different forms of newsprint, cigar and cigarette ash, and even the more esoteric forms of malingering. Why then does he feel the need to look at a reference book to find out about vampires? Furthermore, how can we understand his confidence that simply reaching for the volume ‘V’ will produce a satisfactory con- clusion to his quest? We are clearly led to assume that an introduction to the sum of all things requiring to be known is contained in a collection of 26 volumes; and that Holmes has the complete set ready to hand. Had there been no entry for ‘vampire’ then this might have been sufficient reason for Holmes to deduce that the matter was outside his purview. On the other hand it may simply have intrigued him all the more. Clearly we have moved well beyond the information management context evoked by this scene, but the contexts described by Black and Brunt begin from similar circumstances. Brunt refers to the impromptu manner in which names were recorded, exceptions were dealt with, and indexes multiplied: All stemming from an initial system hardly any more complex or extensive than Sherlock Holmes’ bookshelves. The backdrop to Brunt’s chapter is war and conflict; the information function develops during WWI, falls into abeyance and neglect thereafter, but is revived during WWII. Black lists this as part of one of the eight factors he identifies behind the expansion in the provision of information services in post-1914 UK. What emerges in the 20th century is a set of specific responsibilities and roles for the information officer, information manager, CIO, and so on. At first these seek to incorporate the technology as it is developed within existing organizational practice and procedures. But as the technology develops, people become specialists and de- velop expertise in the technology; seeing new potentials and developing new practices and protocols. In these ensuing developments some skills are discarded and others developed and encouraged. All of these issues are at least as much at the behest of social and political pressures as they are of technical ones. Consideration of the historical bases of the information function in organizations helps us outline some of the core features of information management. In particular
- 12. 68 Antony Bryant it forces our attention on the way in which the early stages of information mana- gement centred on the organization of information — or of records — to facilitate access and retrieval. The protocols, the indexes, and so on that feature in Black’s and Brunt’s chapters were devices developed to enhance information management as the volume of information expanded beyond a simple head-full. Indeed it was not simply the gross amount of information that expanded beyond human grasp, but what we now might term meta-information, or information-about-information. Brunt’s (2004) work on the developments at Bletchley Park demonstrates the ways in which classifying, cataloguing, and indexing of information are key characteristics of any information function. In a world increasingly dominated by Google and Wikipedia it might seem retrograde to look back on these indexing and cataloguing skills, and lament their demise. Yet it is becoming apparent that without some more powerful forms of information classification and retrieval the ‘information age’ is in danger of becoming a ‘data age’ — an era marked more by storage and growth of repositories than in actual intelligent use of information itself: A challenge for the CIO and information managers in general. References Ackoff, R. L. (1967). Management misinformation systems. Management Science, 14(4), 147–158. Babbage, C. (1832). On the economy of machinery and manufacture. London: Charles Knight. Barnard, C. (1938/1972), The functions of the executive (30th anniversary ed.). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Beer, S. (1981). The brain of the firm: Managerial cybernetics of organization. London: Allen Lane. Bell, D. (1976). The coming of post-industrial society. New York: Basic Books. Beniger, J. (1989). The control revolution: Technological and economic origins of the information society. Cambridege, MA: Harvard University Press. Berman, B. (1989). The computer metaphor: Bureaucratizing the mind. Science as Culture, 7–42. Black, A. (2001). The Victorian information society: Surveillance, bureaucracy and public librarianship in nineteenth-century Britain. The Information Society, 17(1), 63–80 January–March. Black, A., Muddiman, D., & Plant, H. (2007). The early information society: Information management in Britain before the computer. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate. Brunt, R. (2004). Indexes at the Government Code and Cypher School, Bletchley Park, 1940– 1945. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 291–299; available at http://www.chemheritage.org/events/asist2002/24-brunt.pdf Bryant, A. (2006). Thinking informatically: A new understanding of information, communication, and technology. Lampeter, UK: Edwin Mellen. Conan Doyle, A. (1924). The Adventure of the Sussex Vampire, available at http://sherlock- holmes.classic-literature.co.uk/the-adventure-of-the-sussex-vampire (originally published in The Casebook of Sherlock Holmes, 1924). Drucker, P. (1994). Post-capitalist society. New York: Harper Business. Ellul, J. (1980). The technological system. New York: Continuum.
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