We are confronted by staggering amounts of new information every day; some of it valid, some of it contrived. Career professionals in particular can be easily overwhelmed by the wealth of information related to competitor data, new product and service launches, market changes, and industry trends and wind up with information anxiety.

Although we have access to a variety of information and communication tools, how do we narrow down tens of thousands of journals, magazines, newsletters, and blog posts at our disposal and manage information coming in? How do we flourish amidst thousands of printed pages, not to mention millions of pages on the web, and hundreds of emails, phone calls and text messages?

More Information, More Confusion

While we enjoy a growing capability to extract relevant information that supports our careers and our lives, most of what we encounter is of marginal value, at best, and often stands in the way of our goals and objectives.  We don’t have hours on end to contend with everything that competes for our attention; most days, it feels as if we don’t have sufficient time at all.

Fortunately, we can employ 10 strategies in a manner that will be productive and even enjoyable and fight that information overload:

• Contemplate in advance the kind of information you seek.

• Identify the vital information carriers.

• Streamline your intake capability.

• Beware of information crutches.

• Establish a distribution system.

• Be thoughtful when sending information.

• Design responses.

• Do away with paper.

• Constantly review and update.

• Acknowledge the benefits of remaining organized.

Contemplate in Advance the Kind of Information You Seek 

Have a reasonable idea of the type of information you want and need to gather. Such information encompasses news about your industry or profession; notable product and service developments; significant regulations and new legislation; client, customer, or consumer-related information; special applications; intelligence on competitors; and emerging trends and prospects.

Identify the Vital Information Carriers 

Identify the small number of key information sources, including publications, websites, blogs, and hard news sources, that cover what’s occurring in the field. You’ll really only need three to four sources; you’d be surprised at the amount of coverage overlap you’ll see.

Streamline Your Intake Capacity 

Once you recognize the kind of information you require and a handful of the best sources, you need to establish a methodical way of receiving, synthesizing, and applying such information that will benefit you, your team, and your organization.

Staying attuned to your goals and objectives and focusing on the kind of information that supports your efforts gives you the best chance to accomplish what you want. You might consider reducing social networking, depending on your job. Your quest is to maintain a constant inflow of relevant information in as simple a manner as possible. Yes, on occasion you can give attention to peripheral issues. In general, however, focus on the information that will make a difference in your effectiveness.

Beware of Information Crutches 

Many people have a predisposition to collect and retain information that confirms what they already believe or know to be true. They don’t need to save such information; the practice is more like a reflex action. With the vast amounts of information on the Internet today and the power of search engines, it’s not necessary to hang on to much.

More vital is the ability to find what you need in a hurry, which often requires only a few keystrokes. Retaining piles and files of hard copy information is of diminishing value and can impede your effectiveness. Moreover, files and information that you retain for more than 18 months often can be deleted with no detrimental effects.

Establish a Distribution System 

As you rise in your career, don’t spend inordinate amounts of time gathering information. Much of what you seek can be identified, collected, and disseminated to you by junior staff. You can use them as information scouts and as a clipping service of sorts to pre-read for you.

Once freed from the constant task of identifying and assembling information, you’re better able to think conceptually in ways that will help to propel your team, division, or department forward. This is especially true when introducing a new product, service, or delivery system.

Be Thoughtful When Sending Information

Sometimes the staggering amounts of information is due to our lack of organizing guidelines. Such guidelines could otherwise spare us from unnecessary, excessive exposure to information that does not support our current challenges.

Learn to be more discriminating when exchanging information. Eliminate acronyms, abbreviations, and jargon that can lead to misunderstandings, and limit the length of your correspondence with others by including only what is necessary to know. Overwhelming our recipients with information is no more welcome to them than when they overwhelm us. We also must encourage one another to stop CCing and BCCing when it is not necessary, and avoid submitting “FYI” kinds of messages.

Design Responses

Throughout the workweek, you’ll receive many different types of requests. Many are routine, so you can automate your responses by using your email’s signature function. Most email software programs today support at least 20 different signatures. You can create and save signatures by category that enable you to respond promptly and effectively to customers and clients. The signatures that you’ve developed can also be personalized to address the particulars of a specific inquiry.

What kinds of signatures might you create in advance? Rosters, standard letters, product and service descriptions, price lists, team or organizational descriptions, credentials, etc. The more signatures you establish, the quicker and more productively you can answer questions from inquirers.

Do Away With Paper (When Practical) 

A variety of hard copy files and documents will need to be retained. Nevertheless, you can undertake a campaign to reduce the volume of paper you’re retaining, whether it’s in filing cabinets, desk drawers, or storage bins.

Evaluating each document you receive and consider whether it merits saving. Will a scanned version of said document suffice? If so, scan it and recycle the hard copy. Yes, scanning requires extra time and effort, but in the long run the payoff is more than worth it. When you effectively label each of the documents you’ve scanned, you enhance your ability to quickly locate them on your hard drive or online. Finding such e-documents is generally easier than finding the hard copy.

Constantly Review and Update 

Periodically review your documents. Is the information still relevant? Does it need to be combined with something else? Should it be reclassified? Your goal is to keep your holdings to a minimum.

Tackle only a handful of file folders at a time, so you don’t feel overwhelmed. Ask yourself, “What can be deleted? What should be merged? What can be extracted so that the few gems of wisdom crucial to my success can be applied as needed?” Think of this task with a project management hat on and take it step-by-step.

Acknowledge the Benefits of Remaining Organized 

Staying organized might make you anxious. Organizing is certainly not a glamorous task. Yet, in a world that overwhelms us with the volume of information and communication, becoming the master of your files, and maintaining them so they serve you, is more important than ever before. Information overload occurs when we let things pile up. The people who become adept at recognizing, gathering, retrieving, and applying the right information at the right time are valuable to their organizations and their teams.

The future belongs to ultra-productive people who understand the importance of information and communication management. Regardless of the obstacles they face, these adept information managers are capable of pointing their team or organization in the appropriate direction. Why? They have a well-developed ability to identify, assemble, and impart knowledge that they extract from information.

Ultimately they can draw upon their knowledge to lead with wisdom.

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In her classic book, Lions Don’t Need to Roar, Deborah Benton observes that while it’s essential to be competent in one’s position, inspire confidence in others, and act accordingly in business situations, most people don’t make it to the top, or anywhere near there.

Benton says top influencers “are not magical, blessed, or dramatically different from you or me. They simply have skills and outlooks that the rest of us don’t have, but can get,” such as taking calculated risks and enhancing their “people” skills.

Calculate Your Risk

Top achievers understand that staying put can be risky and so they take decisive action. In their book, Surfacing the Edge of Chaos, authors Richard Pascale, Mark Milleman, and Linda Gioja argue that “equilibrium is a precursor to death.”

The people who rise to the top have the guts to take calculated risks – realizing that the experience will be invaluable – and make that phone call that others would rather avoid. For example, Benton knows of executive managers who have called individuals months after they were fired from their firm to “see how they were doing.”

One company executive remarked that when he evaluated a job candidate, he would get leery if the candidate appeared to be too good. “If I see no failures, I assume he’s had it too easy.” Could this mean that, on the path to accomplishing a lot, now and then you’re going to have some failures? The notion of taking calculated risks runs deep among those who eventually get to the top.

People Are the Key

A popular stereotype holds that top sellers tend to be nose to the grindstone types. However, Benton finds the situation to be the opposite. The highly accomplished laugh and smile often, are fond of telling stories as long as they convey a point, and know how and when to physically touch others. They’re also well-skilled in the ability to ask for favors and they fully realize how important that makes others feel.

Regardless of how high-tech society becomes, people make deals, make products, and provide services. Pacesetters learn the essential elements about interacting with people that many others never do. High achievers in larger organizations learn to “read” others in great detail and to recognize the importance of paying attention to others’ needs.

By “observing aggressively” anyone can learn to read people, and by reading people, work better with them. Meeting those needs enables successful people to negotiate deals skillfully, manage employees responsibly with the least amount of stress and resistance, gain information, or enlist people to support their cause. The characteristic required in this process is that of “aggressive observation.”

Aggressive observation, a phrase coined decades ago by the late Mark McCormack, author of Staying Street Smart in the Internet Age, holds that what you observe about a person is more revealing than what you hear or read. When two people meet, aggressive observation requires that a person take action, carefully listening to the content of the conversation and watching for signals in body language.

One of the widely observed traits that high achievers possess is resilience. Resilience entails adopting behaviors to meet challenges, but it is more than simply enduring a challenging situation or overcoming an ordeal. It means having the ability to come back even stronger than before. Getting big things done or even winning a long-term personal struggle, requires resilience which is demonstrated through patience, alertness, and steadfastness. These behaviors set the stage for adaptation and action.

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