A Ranty Blogpost

K, I guess this blog is chalk-full of rants. I love getting worked up about any number of things. Inner peace, I'm putting you on hold for a minute while I rant about ethics tonight.

I can't stand scammers. First a big caveat -- I am not a saint, many people would consider some of my behaviour incredibly unethical. They are not me. And no one should judge. Fine. But I've got to get this off my chest.

It really burns me to see people working the system, trying to get something for nothing. Tonight I heard a fellow public servant brag about working only one hour per day. He's proud of the fact that he purchased a brand new SUV he didn't need so he could have it shipped overseas and back on the fed's dime for a 2-yr foreign assignment, just so he could avoid paying taxes. He's proud of this. It turns my stomach. Someone ends up paying asshole! What is it about cheating that's so appealing? Maybe this guy feels like he's really stickin' it to the man? Problem is, it becomes a way of life, you don't even realize you're doing it anymore and you pass it on to your kids.  Also, think of the wasted time inventing new ways to scam the system. And in turn, society has to invest in anti-fraud -- people, policies, technology. I sound completely polly-anna here when I say that if everyone just did the right thing because it was the right thing to do .... I can't even finish my sentence. It's hopeless.

Next time this dude brags about his scams, I'm going to voice my objection. He won't change, but at least he'll know that not everyone thinks that this is cool.

Information Management is Dead

I'm starting to read more and more about the death of my profession as an IM Specialist and rather than refute it or bury my head in the sand, I couldn't agree more.

I often get stuck on explaining just what IM is.  So I revert to a tired slogan for lack of anything else more concise -- 'it's about being able to make sure that the right information is available at the right time in the right format and at the right cost'. In the old days of paper, you relied on Records Managers to describe, organize, search and retrieve your records. But once digitial information arrived, the RM became obsolete. End users managed their own files at their desktop and the rigor of classifying and culling information was thrown by the way side, which is why shared drives are basically dumping grounds of poorly described, duplicate, and obsolete information. Enter the IM Specialist -- someone with the same organizational and analytical skills as the Records Manager, but who is comfortable with technology and can advise on how to navigate your digital nightmare using best practices (which are so pathetically obvious, it's hard to believe that someone actually pays me to do this). You don't know what to name your file? -- How about just calling it what it is? You don't know what information to delete in your email? Try most of what's in your inbox for starters.

One of the big responsibilities of the IM Specialist is to develop a 'Retention Schedule' which is supposed to be a mission critical document that says -- "this is what we keep information on and this is how long we keep it for". So if the company gets sued and can't come up with the documents or emails, they simply point to their approved Retention Schedule and say "too bad so sad, the information was deleted and this here Retention Schedule covers our asses". I won't bore you with how we come up with this magical schedule. In fact all I've done in my six years in this field is talk about it. We have yet to actually DO IT.

Corporate risk doesn't really resonate with end users, so I usually sell it with Search. If you keep everything, including the crap, it'll be harder to find the good shit, right? (of course I attenuate at work, just not in my blog). This is usually sellable because we all know how shitty desktop searching is -- if I search for 'information management', I'll get everything with the words 'information', 'management' or even fucking 'ment' in it. But thanks to advances in technology, namely Google, why delete anything? There is no master Retention Schedule for the Internet, baby! If you have a kick-ass search tool, the good stuff will float to the top and the crap info will remain out of sight. The only time we need to actually delete anything is if there's legislation that stipulates that you have to get rid of something after a specific time period. And really, there's NOT a lot of these out there.

So here I am once again working on 'the Retention Schedule', only I don't believe in it anymore. It's a bloody waste of time to go around asking people what information has value to them. If someone asked you this, wouldn't you think "everything I write has value, you dolt!". And then I have to ask: "How long do you need to keep it for" ... To which they reply: "Why not forever, isn't storage cheap? I can pick up a 1 TB removable drive for $40 at Staples, so don't tell me it's costly for you to store my files. Go tinker with some server in a closet and stop wasting my time, you idiot. Jeesh. How much do they pay those CSes, again?"

So between this and my rant about the uselessness of organizing and classifying information, my profession is already dead. Time for a career change. What though?

Classification

Warning: another ranty blogpost.
My boss is counting on me to develop a magic classification system for the entire organization. She thinks I'll be able to just pull it out of my ass -- a magical system that every scrap of information can be categorized against; one that is both intuitive and user-friendly, and seamlessly supports search, retrieval and disposal.

Here's what I have to say about that: IT AIN'T GONNA HAPPEN SISTA.

First of all, if it was so important and easy to do, then it'd be done by now... and not by me, but by the people who create information in the first place.

Secondly, this is NOT how the real world works. Yes, we need order. Humans naturally group and categorize. Traditionally, foldering aids retrieval. However, information does not fit neatly into singular folders. It's organic, it links, it can be about MANY subjects ... so why stuff it in ONE folder? Folders are DEAD.

So what about 'logical' folders, or tagging? Well .... it's not going to happen either. Not only because we've gone too long without ever having to describe our information, but because the value of a particular piece of information is not always known at the point of creation. It may start out as a simple idea and evolve into something greater. Just look at the web. Do we put things away in folders and click through them to find information? Hell no, we search. Plus, not everything ends up in a 'document'. Thanks to the web, there are many ways to collaborate. Things can indeed happen without spinning documents.

Organization is also personal. We all like the flexibility of having our own systems -- by subject, priority, project, or not at all. Don't impose some kludgy taxonomy that will be out-of-date the minute it's created AND make it harder for me to find my information, just don't.

This blog is a case in point. Some time ago a friend suggested I blog about my purge as I seemed to be having more fun with talking about it than actually doing it. It was also a polite way to say "not that interested D, tell the blog sphere instead". It turned out to be great advice because I'm able to get all my ideas out of my head and make room for ... other useless ideas. I did not attempt any kind of tagging or classification because I did not know what I would be blogging about. Dreaming up potential tags seemed pointless. So I decided to wait until a critical mass was created and then I would let the information show me where there were recurring themes (such as parenting, relationships, enlightenment, fitness, etc.). I'm now at that point. Looking up older posts is painful because I have to remember 'when' I created them. Nothing is really linked so where I've expanded on a particular idea (such as gentle discipline) I have to click through many posts until I find what I want. So will I go back to all 100 posts and tag them? No, I will not. And so it goes.

Maybe I should look closer at auto-classification tools. Users DO NOT want to be burdened with this. I do not want to impose this on anyone. How the hell am I going to convince my management that this is a complete waste of time? FML.

We are one

You know how dog owners often resemble their pets? I feel like my partner and I have morphed into a single married blob. I thought this wasn't supposed to happen for another 20 years!

He used to be the ying to my yang. But now I'm more relaxed and he's uptight. I'm less opinionated and don't give a shit about so many things that used to really piss me off. He's always trying to be productive and doesn't make time to relax. I'm all about fitness whereas he used to be the freak. Of course not everything has flip-flopped. A lot of our demeanor, expressions, interests are EXACTLY THE SAME. He even looks and dresses like me! Other people are starting to notice too. It makes me want to shave my head, join a cult, do anything that is DIFFERENT. Please, I need some diversity in my life.

On the upside, it's certainly more harmonious when you share the same interests and opinions. No disagreements over what movie to see, which restaurant to eat at, who to vote for, what CD to listen to, etc. And lord knows there's enough other things we can bicker about. But it's also fucking boring being a married blob. How do old people do it?

Hopefully getting back to work and being around non-family members again will help. I love my family dearly, but I'm missing my identity. Plus I've changed so much that I don't even know who I am anymore! One thing is for sure though, this Bobbsey Twin is steppin' out and getting a life.

So, what do you do?

Panic. What the fuck is it I do? I should really have that two minute elevator spiel ready -- I love feeling prepared after all. It's just really hard to describe what I do in layman's terms. Actually, it's hard describing what I do without people thinking -- ohhhh, that's so sad ... didn't you used to be an IT Consultant? How much do file clerks make these days anyway? So I stammer through some kind of half-assed job description until eyes glaze over and then I start talking about what I WANT to do which makes things worse because I'm basically lying at this point. And then I just desperately try to change the topic or make an excuse to leave the room.

No more. I've been thinking a lot about the gist of my job and I think I can safely say that I am a Professional Organizer ... of information. You know those Designers on TV that expose people's embarrassing junk, force them to purge all their precious memories (the more tears the better) and then miraculously create a system that really organizes nothing because any mementos of everyday living (toys, mail, books and other shit) have been hidden off camera? My job is similar in that I preach to people about how sacred information is and how its access and storage need to be 'managed' (whatever that means). And just when I have people convinced that they are flushing their valuable knowledge down the toilet and they are ready to step it up ... I tell them that I have NO answers. Yeah, well we 'could' be using technology to describe and store all of your information so that it can be effortlessly found, seamlessly retrieved and re-used again and again .... but you know, there's never enough MONEY, and well it would require that everyone pitch in and work TOGETHER on this and besides, our group have their heads so far up their asses that it will NEVER happen. So just go back to doing what you've always done, it's just now you can feel badly about it.

K - the cynicism is not going to serve me well in my career. Problem is, I've lost my faith! I've got to find some glimmer of hope to hold on to. Work has to be more than a pay cheque for me. If I don't start adding value, then I'm wasting more than only my time at the office. Thankfully, I think there's enough flexibility to make my job what I want it to be. Now, just to figure out what that is .... stay tuned.