Overview

We live in what is frequently called the Information Age. Never before has so much information been available to so many people so easily. As a result, while possessing information is still important, the ability to locate information is becoming a very valuable skill. Furthermore, the ability to sort, skim, or discern the gem of useful information from an information glut is becoming even more essential.

Becoming familiar with the various research tools at your disposal—hard copy, online, and Internet sources—will save you a great deal of time and energy in your quests for knowledge. But finding information is only half the task. Without the ability to think critically and evaluate your sources and findings carefully, you may end up relying on useless, outdated, or erroneous information. The skills you learn and practice in this chapter will help ensure your ability to successfully gather and evaluate information from a wide variety of sources.

As more information becomes readily available at the click of a mouse, and as you store more and more of that information inside your head, your value increases for your employer. New issues are raised. Copyright, the ownership of ideas and creative work; patents, the legal protection of a unique invention, utility, or even a brilliant navigational solution; and workplace privacy all come under contention. Workers are seen as intellectual assets for their firms, nearly weighed on a balance sheet in the same fashion as a warehouse inventory was counted as capital in the Industrial Age. A well-known saying sums up this shift of value: Information Age companies are the only places where more than half of the company's assets walk out the door every night.

Learning to see yourself as an information asset means you often become inextricably linked to both technology and research. What it means to be an information worker or manager is still being redefined. Workers themselves and their intellectual products have become part of the bottom line. Whether you are willing to let yourself be defined in that way will be up to you.