Be the star of the show

Ever since Stewart Brand declared that “information wants to be free” in 1984, he has been misquoted and misinterpreted.

What he actually said was: “On the one hand, information wants to be expensive because it’s so valuable: the right information in the right place just changes your life. On the other hand, information wants to be free because the cost of getting it out is getting lower and lower all the time. So you have these two fighting against each other.”

When the web went public several years later and started to provide an astonishing volume of information, the “free information” idea moved over easily into mainstream thinking. Google and Wikipedia alone have produced the illusion that anything anyone wants is right there, on tap. In this case, by tapping a few keys.

And a lot of the time, it works brilliantly well. Users get what they want, more or less immediately. And good luck to them. After all, it means that you, the information professional can save yourself for better things. Unfortunately, it also means that you run the risk of receding from users’ consciousness.

Many users don’t think they need information professionals any more, even when they’re wasting their time on interminable fruitless queries.

They may see you as a bottleneck, complicating information access in a misguided attempt to preserve your own value. This doesn’t go down too well in a changing world in which power derives more from sharing than hoarding. They will sidestep you if at all possible, even though you still have much to offer.

In fact, their unwillingness to approach you becomes a bottleneck of their own making. Users would do better to spend a little time briefing you than to waste more of their own, or, worse, make do with poor results.

If you’ve not done so already, it’s time to carve out a value-based proposition which, in cold business terms, shows how you can improve your organisation’s performance and save it money into the bargain.

And, while you’re at it, you can create a much more satisfying career for yourself.
Look at people who are happy with their lot: they’ve found a way of getting paid well for doing what they love and what they’re good at. It’s a case of matching market need with your passion and your abilities.

Assuming that you are very knowledgeable and skilled in navigating the world of information and that you enjoy doing it, then the passion and ability bits are taken care of. Your challenge is either to articulate your value to others in terms they understand or to carve out a new information-based role in the organisation.

Let’s start by looking at your clients and prospects.

Do you know who they are? Do you know why they come to you? Can you get them to quantify the benefits they get? Are there more like them in your organisation or in the community you serve?

Find the answers
Because you’re unlikely to have a sales and marketing orientation, it’s quite possible you don’t know the answers to these questions. But unless you know them, you are trying to operate with one hand tied behind your back.

If you can’t nail this sort of information from real people (using their stories is always the most powerful way of attracting new customers), then you will have to guess. Perhaps start with a statement that summarises the key elements of your story. Choose your own words, but perhaps this could act as a starting point: “My clients are people who value their time. They need high-quality and relevant information packaged appropriately and delivered in time for it to be useful to them.”

If their time is valuable, they’re not going to want to waste it on rummaging through the web and other information sources when they can get someone else to do it for them faster and cheaper.

Ideally you will have provided them with self-service options, perhaps in a dashboard-style portal, which gives them ready access to all the predictable information sources they might need. By the time they come to you it will be for interesting and challenging searches that are beyond their capabilities. Because they have tried and failed through conventional means, you are likely to be presented with fairly articulate requests. They will know that the information you present will come from reputable sources. And your results will be highly valued as a consequence.

Your knowledge of your clients means you know how to package up your findings.

Clients differ. A managing director is likely to prefer a summary in plain English with a business orientation. An accountant will want hard numbers and links to the sources. The more skilled you are at delivering results in the form that suits your clients, the more time you will save them and the higher they will value you and your service. Some people will be happy just to receive a storyboard of related web pages. It’s all about horses for courses.

Like this story? Spread the news by clicking below:

 del.icio.us     Digg this     reddit!