It said:
·



Data--information--knowledge--understanding--wisdom.




I would ask some initial questions and those are; what is
the purpose of the search? why do we
need to know more about something? what
do we propose to do with the results when they have been established and
verified?
It reminded me of Herb Meyer, a brilliant Vistage speaker
who had been in a very senior position in the CIA, who made the point very
succinctly that the fist necessity is to gather as much data as possible and
frankly, that is relatively simple in these days of highly effective online search
facilities.
It may well be a different matter for the CIA, NSA, MI5 and
6, GCHQ and so on where the data gathering exercise is way out of our normal
reach, but for the ordinary mortal wishing to know more about salient factors
in business, then it is a simple task.
However, what we finish up with is a vast amount of
uncoordinated data through which we need to trawl to establish the really
important aspects of our requirement.
That is the analytical phase of the exercise and is probably
the most complex and important factor.
Unless we are able to cut through the dross (and there will be plenty),
drill down and determine what is truly relevant then the whole project will
founder.
Again, each phase of the research needs to be rigorously
tested against the initial questions; are we fulfilling the purpose, are we
gaining from the work and will we be able to take action as a consequence of
it?
That is a significant question and one which does not appear
on the original flow chart. One must
assume that the purpose of research of this nature in business is to take
action on as low a risk profile as possible.
The key is to take action and it is essential to decide at
some point in the research process whether there is sufficient valid
information available to mitigate the risk and to enable action to be taken.
Having reduced the mass of data to a manageable size which
can now be defined as information, the next step is to reduce it further as Heb
Meyer says to intelligence and that is in the security sense.
David Roberts’ chart calls it knowledge and in the halls of
academia through which he now prowls that is a perfectly acceptable
definition. However in the business
world when decisions need to be made and actioned it is better, I would
suggest, to consider this phase as intelligence which permits action to be
taken.
In the true learning experience this would lead to
understanding and when properly validated and used leads on to wisdom, a
consummation devoutly to be desired in that environment.
That is not to say that business leaders do not gain wisdom;
rather for them it comes through the accumulated experience of success and the
occasional failure and that can be a hard school.
The ancient Jewish mysticism of Kabbalah defines the whole
process as intuition leading to understanding which leads to knowledge and
hence wisdom. Perhaps we need a few more
business leaders who understand the process and put it into action. It really does work.
Download my book "Leading to Success" from the Amazon Kindle store
Visit www.vistage.co.uk
Email ivan.goldberg@vistagechair.co.uk
Follow me on LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook
Download my book "Leading to Success" from the Amazon Kindle store
Visit www.vistage.co.uk
Email ivan.goldberg@vistagechair.co.uk
Follow me on LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook
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