Info Overload

The other day I heard someone on the other side of the cubicle wall ask "what does this acronym mean?," referring to the name of another organization with which we sometimes work. She has a tendency to talk a lot anyway, so I just rolled my eyes and didn't answer, thinking "there's a box on your desk with a keyboard and a screen that connects you to THE WORLD, and in about 5 seconds you could get the answer."

To be fair, she's a bit older (yes, even older than me!) and wasn't raised with an "always on" connection to the internet, with all its right and wrong answers, its good and bad information. She may not yet have transitioned to the frame of mind that uses "Google" as a verb or that expects -- nay, demands! -- immediate access to information. She doesn't read her newspapers online, she doesn't find old friends or keep up with current ones through Facebook or MySpace or LinkedIn, and she doesn't map out her trip to the grocery store and get traffic conditions for different routes. She doesn't really understand what a blog is.

But we do. In particular, many of your younger Creatives do.

We have so much information available to us, and it's so easy to go get it. Some of it comes through a "pull" system, like going to different websites or leaving an office TV tuned to CNBC. Some of it is a "push" system, whether we're on mailing lists or getting individual e-mails. We can access that from so many places with wi-fi, Blackberries, iPhones, and more.

The availability of information can be very useful for Creatives. Many new ideas are developed from a synthesis of existing ideas. A news story can spark a new way of thinking about something. We can reach out and get answers in a hurry so we don't waste time digging for answers and instead can get back to our creative work. We can see what others in our field (including our competitors) are doing. And we can take a quick break, when we need to rest our brains, and just look at YouTube. The immediacy of our information access is a good thing.

But...

...and there's always a "but," isn't there?...

...too much information can overwhelm us.

If you take in too much information you'll have trouble processing it, and that whole idea of synthesizing various ideas to come up with something new won't work. Never mind that time spent online, on the Blackberry, or on the phone is time spent not working, there's also the problem that when you ARE working, it might not provide the high quality work you want.

Kathleen Parker recently wrote in the Washington Post that

...with so much data coming from all directions, we risk paralysis. Brain freeze, some call it. More important, we also risk losing our ability to process the Big Ideas that might actually serve us better...

In fact, brain research shows that we do our best thinking when we're not engaged and focused, yet fewer of us have time for downtime. (If you have to schedule relaxation, is it still relaxing?)

Daydreaming, we used to call it. Ask any creative person where they got their best ideas and they'll say, "Dunno. Just came to me out of the blue." If you're looking for Eureka -- as in the Aha! moment -- you probably won't find it while following David Gregory's Tweets. Or checking Facebook to see who might be "friending" whom. Or whose status has been updated. George Orwell is . . . More likely, the ideas that save the world will present themselves in the shower or while we're sweeping the front stoop. What the world needs now isn't more, but less. The alternative to mindless activities for the mindful is turning out to be not a less-informed nation but a dumber one.

Unchecked "infomania" -- yes, there's even a term for this instapathology -- can lead to a lower IQ, according to a 2005 Hewlett-Packard study. The research, conducted by a University of London psychologist, found that people distracted by e-mail and phone calls lost 10 IQ points, more than twice the impact of smoking marijuana -- or comparable to losing a night's sleep.

Just as too much candy rots your teeth, apparently so too does too much information rot your brain.

The solution is not to unplug the cable modem or confiscate the phones. As is the case anytime there are benefits and costs to something, you need to strike the right balance. Making polices about shutting down information, like limiting internet usage, can be seen as punishment and can also end up hurting your Creatives' ability to do their jobs...remember, information is good. Instead of trying to force something upon your employees, try teaching them instead. Help them discover the proper balance for themselves, give them the tools to figure this out on their own. You'll end the day with more talented Creatives who are better at getting and using information, and in the process, they won't hate you. Put those to results together -- more skill, no hate -- and that's not a bad outcome.