Overview of Knowledge Acquisition, Organization, Use and Dissemination Techniques

Laura Larsson

Cedar Collaboration

November 6, 2004

All men (humans) by nature desire to know. (Aristotle, Metaphysics)

Agenda/Objectives

• Describe several techniques for acquiring, organizing, collaborating around, conveying/disseminating and securing personal knowledge

• Discussion: What information management methods do you use?

Acquiring information and ideas

• Formulate your question• Search your office for articles, books and reports• Discuss the question with nearby colleagues • Search the Web• Search online factual databases like PubMed• Visit a nearby academic library• Post your question to one or more Listservs or

forums (social networking)• Contact a librarian to get additional help

What Information Do We Collect When We’re Working on a Project?

• Ideas• Notes• Suggestions from

colleagues• Documents • Snippets of

information• URLs/Web pages

• Email messages• PowerPoint

presentations• Quotations• Charts, tables, maps• Images • And so on…

Evaluating information and ideas

• My colleagues will be discussing or have discussed how to evaluate quality and EBPH

• Many Web sites dealing with how to determine quality

• critical thinking

To Keep or Not to Keep? That is the (Important) Question

• Most information is junk – until we need it (80/20 rule)

• Call this unneeded information, “data waste”

• Future importance of a piece of information

• Information fragmentation

Deciding What to Keep

• Difficult decision but is fundamental to personal information management

• Part of the whole issue of determining quality

• Exacerbating the information glut problem with the apps we add

• Get feedback from knowledgeable colleagues

So Now We Have It, So What Do We Do With It? Organizing

information and ideas• Print it out• Cut and paste• Scan onto paper or

digital format• Key it into our PCs,

handhelds• Whiteboards

• Audio/Voice Recorders

• Notebooks (paper) and index cards

• Collect in appropriate applications

• Dive slate

Dive Slates

(A Few) Methods & Applications for Organizing Information

• Desktop folders• Snippet management

applications• Bookmark organizers• Citation managers

• Personal Information Managers (PIMs)

• PDAs• Database managers• Scanners

Desktop Folders

• Organize folders by broad topic

• Use a hierarchy to get to the most relevant document

• Not critical to use My Documents for content

Folder Image

Snippet Management

• Many applications available for collecting bits of text– Unstructured text management – Sticky notes

InfoSelect Image

askSam Image

OneNote Image

Stickies Image

PowerMarks Image

PIMs: Outlook

Outlook, continued…

PDAs

Database Managers

Scanning Documents

• Flat-top scanners (including scanner/copier/faxer combinations )

• Handheld scanners (scanning pens)

• Adobe Acrobat Standard software

• ScanSoft PaperPort software

Citation Manager Image

Analyzing information and ideas

• Most practice-specific category of knowledge work– Skills and tools are unique to each community

of practice (group of practitioners)

• Excel

• Relational database managers

• Mindmapping applications

Conveying Information and Ideas: Sharing/Using Found

Information• Most of the tools we discussed today

facilitate sharing of information in one way or another

• Anything in digital format can be shared– In the current format or converted to another

format

Publishing Tools

• "productivity" suites

• MS Office– Word, MS Publisher, PowerPoint

• Open Office

• HTML editors like DreamWeaver

• Tools for creating elearning

Collaborating around information and ideas

• Personal networks and networking • Discussion lists, chat and Instant Messaging

applications • Facilitation tools

– Brainstorming – Mind mapping applications– Electronic whiteboards

• OneNote• NetMeeting and instant messaging (IM) • TinyURL

Brainstorming/Mindmapping

• BrainStorming applications (Brainstormer)

• Mindmapping applications

Sample Inspiration Mind Map

Securing information and ideas

• Will discuss in my afternoon session

What methods do you use to find, organize, use and

disseminate information?

If it's green, it's biology.

If it stinks, it's chemistry.

If it has numbers, it's math.

If it doesn't work, it's technology.

--Unknown

Contact Information

• Laura Larsson

• Cedar Collaboration

• larsson@cedarc.info or

• larsson@u.washington.edu