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Understanding Enterprise IT Professionals’ Information Use Habits, Preferences, and Satisfaction

Image of Roger Strouse

Authors: Roger Strouse, Vice President & Lead Analyst; Marc Strohlein, Chief Agility Officer; Louise Garnett, Vice President, Outsell Scout Analytics

This report is targeted at information management (IM) professionals and provides data and analysis on information use by IT professionals. IT professionals face a bewildering landscape of technologies, user needs, and business opportunities; their need for information to make solid decisions has never been more critical. While IT professionals have not traditionally relied on IM functions to provide for their information needs, Outsell has observed that most enterprise IM groups now work more closely with IT than previously and depend heavily on IT professionals to support a variety of information management applications. This report is based on Outsell’s most recent end-user survey (December 2008), which sought to better understand the unique information needs and habits of specific functional roles. The report contains:

- An overview profile of IT-professional information consumers, including how they use information and their satisfaction levels with 14 vendors;
- Data and analysis of IT professionals’ information habits and unmet needs;
- A detailed look at IT professionals’ use of interactive media and social networking;
- Data and analysis of IT professionals’ information spending and purchasing;
- Imperatives for information managers who want to build a strong user base within IT.


Pub Date: June 29, 2009
Type: Briefing, Information Management Report
Segments: IM
Keywords: Users
Pages: 25
Format: PDF Application_pdf

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Table of Contents

  • Why This Market?
    1. Methodology
  • Overview Profile of IT Users
  • IT Professionals’ Information Habits and Unmet Needs
  • IT Professionals’ Use of Interactive Media and Social Networking
  • IT Professionals’ Priorities for IM Functions and Roles
  • IT Professionals’ Information Spending and Purchasing
  • Imperatives for Information Managers
  • Related Research

    • Tables & Figures

  • Table 1. IT Professionals Who Run IT: How They Apply Information
  • Table 2. IT Professionals Who Help Drive Business Strategy and Revenue: How They Apply Information
  • Table 3. Top Ten IT Professionals’ Responsibilities and Roles
  • Table 4. Vendor Satisfaction Views – IT
  • Table 5. Top Information Types Used by IT Professionals
  • Figure 1. Where Knowledge Workers Go to Find Information
  • Figure 2. Search Failure Rates
  • Figure 3. Time Spent Gathering and Analyzing Information
  • Figure 4. Major Problems or Obstacles to Getting Information
  • Table 6. Unmet Information Needs
  • Figure 5. Top Handheld Devices
  • Figure 6. Use of Social Networking Sites
  • Figure 7. Professional and Personal Use of Social Networking Sites
  • Figure 8. Priorities for IM Roles and Support
  • Figure 9. Perceived Quality and Usage of Fee vs. Free Information
  • Figure 10. Independent Information Purchasing
  • Figure 11. Locus of Information Purchasing Decisions And Budgets
  • Figure 12. Preferred Pricing Model
  • Figure 13. Median Annual Spending
  • Figure 14. Individual Information Spending, by Format
  • Table 7. Spending by Information Type

Companies Mentioned

  1. AMR Research, Inc.
  2. Burton Group
  3. Corporate Executive Board
  4. Factiva
  5. Forrester Research, Inc.
  6. Gartner, Inc.
  7. IDC
  8. Info-Tech Research Group, Inc.
  9. Nielsen//NetRatings
  10. Ovum plc
  11. TechTarget
  12. TowerGroup
  13. Yankee Group Research, Inc.