Briefing: Information Management Best Practices: Changing User Needs Require Service Revisions

How have information users changed their behaviors over the past four years? This Briefing draws from a new, intensified round of end-user research comprising more than 2,000 interviews to answer that question on many levels. Comparing the 2005 research with results from 2001 shows a number of remarkable trends: today's users are backing off a bit from self-service models and relying more on information intermediaries; users of all kinds are increasingly interested in competitive information; the time users spend gathering information has increased from 8 to 11 hours per average workweek, and that 'gathering time' has also increased in relation to the time spent analyzing and applying it. Another change in this period is a strong consolidation of search engine preferences around Google, compared to the six search engines that reached reasonable numbers in 2001. This Briefing identifies strategies that information managers can use to keep up with the changing needs of users with a 'just-in-time' attitude toward information. It compares user behaviors across five main functional categories: Sales and Marketing, Science and Engineering, Finance/HR/Legal, IT, and Manufacturing and Purchasing. It concludes with seven 'Imperatives for Information Managers' that identify ways to use the changes in user behaviors for competitive advantage in the battle for the hearts and minds of information users.