Since the Stone Age or even before, the ability to share
knowledge and information has been fundamental to the development of the human
race. Just think of how expertise in making flints, then metal tools, pottery,
paper and glass revolutionized our life-style as it spread round the globe! And
think how the opportunities for exploiting information are now even greater.
CILIP has an enviable UK-wide remit to serve our profession across the whole range
of information management specialisms. So why, in the information age, is its
membership contracting?
For months, activists Martin White and Sandra Ward have been
pointing to the needs of business and society, and urging CILIP to grasp the
opportunities. Last week their efforts culminated in an Information Management Summit: Towards transforming organisations and
our profession. Anne Mauger, CILIP’s Chief Executive, showed clear support
for their initiative.
The proceedings
A parade of first-class speakers presented nine different
perspectives, starting with a sparkling keynote address from Clive Holtham,
Professor of Information Management at City University. (See slides from most speakers,
on the Summit
site.) Unsurprisingly, the invited
audience of about 40 senior information professionals responded
enthusiastically. Kate Arnold, President-elect of the Special Libraries
Association, invited all to download a report on The
evolving value of information management and the five essential attributes of the modern information
professional, commissioned by the Financial Times in conjunction with the
SLA. Among other heady stuff the report stresses the importance of
“decision-ready information” and invites “an urgent response from information
professionals that clearly demonstrates their value to organizations”.
Speaking for CILIP, Annie Mauger promised commitment to
supporting its practitioner members in this field. CILIP could not claim to
cover every aspect of IM, she felt, nor to be IM’s only voice in the
professional society space. But there would certainly be support for the IM
Project Board which the organizers are bent on establishing. As follow-up, an
open meeting will be held at Ridgmount St on 2nd December. The Board wants to
support CILIP members and their organizations in improving IM practice; one
component will be to develop and share tools and position papers that IM
practitioners can use to influence progress in the workplace. We're all invited to contribute to the Project and make use of the outcomes.
And how does all this bear on Knowledge Organization (KO)?
KO and IM practitioners face many of the same challenges. KO
lies at the heart of information management, providing the theoretical
underpinning for many IM techniques. As Liane Kordan pointed out in her talk
about self-development from librarian to information management consultant, “Some
things remain the same…. there’s just more information in different formats and
various places. But we still need to classify, with a good understanding of
customer needs”.
KO, a field that was founded on the study of classification,
is a key thread in the weave of information management. In the picture below,
which illustrates how the Institute of Information Scientists and the Library
Association merged to form CILIP and carry forward the still evolving IM
agenda, KO is the most basic thread originally shared by the IIS and the LA.
Members of CILIP and of ISKO (International Society for
Knowledge Organization) both find their skills and contribution are little
known and undervalued – even though KO techniques have applications all around
us. If society and the economy are to benefit, we all need to maintain our own
self-development and get our voices more confidently heard at top management level.
ISKO UK will continue its programme of events to help members share their experiences
and learn from others. Its collaboration will continue with UKeiG, IRSG, CILIP,
SLA and other bodies interested in information management. News from the IM
Project Board will be welcome grist for the mill.
Stella Dextre Clarke
Chair, ISKO UK
Posts
2 comments:
As usual, my colleague Stella Dextre Clarke is fair and constructive in her report of the attempts by Martin White, Sandra Ward (and Peter Griffiths) to get CILIP to acknowledge more strongly the debris of the former Institute of
Information Scientists, now manifesting its activities under the banner of 'Information Management'. I fully support this initiative, but wonder whether the conservative and librarian-dominated CILIP will give proper prominence to the sub-discipline of
information management. The irony is that information management is (or should be) the natural core activity of CILIP, seen wherever information resources (books, documents, records
images, web-pages etc.,) are organized and made available in libraries,
archives, intranets and the Internet.
A further irony is that CILIP is the owner of the Journal of Information Science - inherited from the Institute.
I had no idea when posting this blog that Peter Griffiths had died - and regret my ignorance. Peter was a powerful character and I know he was behind the IM initiative. His influence will be missed.
Alan Gilchrist
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