- By: Áine Byrne
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Be Aware Of The Swivel Chair Effect - Information Overload
In today’s world, we live in an age of information. But, more and more, within the workplace, we are getting information overload. This overload comes from so much information being thrown at us and creating confusion, so we no longer know where to look. In other words, we end up with the swivel chair effect.
Large amounts of information are good, isn’t it?
The explosion of work management, asset management, and business performance tools has led to a huge increase in data available to us. We need this information to help us understand how we are performing on a business and individual level, but how can we make sense of all this information without getting overwhelmed?
Sure, the devil is in the detail, but sometimes the detail is the distraction. If you are trying to understand visitor flows through a train station to better understand how to manage the customers, focusing on the individuals will be a distraction. To be effective, you need to look at it from a very high-level perspective. This same approach comes into play within capability management, marketing, business analysis, and many more disciplines. You need the microdata to allow you to build the macro picture from which to take action.
There is another angle you need to understand. While a tool may provide you with an abundance of information, it may be that only one portion of it is necessary for the job at hand. What’s needed is the intelligence and understanding of the context to identify the key messages from all the information at hand in the relevant timeframe. All the other information is considered a digital distraction, something that you need to ignore. And this can be a lot harder to do, what’s needed in this instance are established processes and measurable key metrics or KPIs (Key Performance Indicator) in place to help guide the users to recognise which bits of information to pull out for establishing actionable intelligence.
How will the swivel chair effect impact your company?
The impact the swivel chair effect can have on your company will depend on the industry you operate within. For example, in an operational environment like an operational user in Rail operations or Airport and Air Traffic Operations having too much data available would cause too much noise for the operator. In this instance, the operator would be bombarded by alerts, each competing for their attention and distracting them from their job at hand. Here, the operator needs to know which alerts are critical and which can be muted to reduce noise and help focus on what needs to be instantly actioned.
All this extra noise adds up to a distraction, slower decision-making times, and ultimately fatigue. Three things you don’t want here or in any other environment.
But it can have a far more hazardous impact. Should the swivel chair effect occur in critical infrastructure it could be declared a risk to human life. When it comes to airports or rail infrastructure, they need clear information to understand the situation at any given time to ensure passengers can embark, travel and disembark safely. Or when it comes to train infrastructure you need accurate data showing the state of all the assets. Information overload here could result in a very serious incident occurring.
How do you mitigate against it?
The answer is easy. Simply cut down the amount of information available to digest. In practice, it’s not really that straightforward.
To achieve this in reality, it comes back to context. What is the context of the information you have and how does it relate to the end goal you are aiming for? If you can decipher this you will then create a base from which you can drill down and make informed decisions on what information is critical, which is nice to have, and which is just superfluous to the job at hand. With this done, you can then start focusing on meeting your measurable key metrics and ensure the information you receive allows you to make the right decisions.
As for the rest of the information? Well, it has its place and can still be used constructively. You just need to understand how and where.
The right information in the right place
Everything in moderation. This is something we often hear when it comes to alcoholic drinks, cakes, sweet treats, and other guilty pleasures we may have (thinking Candy Crush here…).
It’s the same with information. Don’t get caught in the trap of thinking more information equals more power. It doesn’t. What you need to get is the right information in the right place for it to be effective. Once you’ve mastered this, you can say goodbye to the swivel chair effect, and any subsequent whiplash that comes with it!
If you would like help understanding the data you are collecting and how best to utilise it within your organisation, reach out via the form below and we would be happy to talk it through with you.