Searching but not finding

In July 2005 the Quarterly Survey from McKinsey Consulting1 reported on the Global Executive Survey that the company had conducted among 7800 executives in 132 countries, a fifth of them at Chief Executive Officer (CEO) or Chief Information Officer (CIO) level. Overall, 29% of CEO/CIO-level respondents and 40% of other senior managers reported that it was difficult to find information on which to make company-wide decisions. This is a very worrying finding. Companies are flying blind, and making highly risky decisions without being able to find information that they have already created and stored.

Among many others was a survey carried out in 2004 by Vascom Bourne on behalf of Inxight Software among IT Directors in the UK financial services sector. According to the survey:

For a number of years Susan Feldman and her colleagues in the Content Management and Retrieval Solutions research group of IDC (International Data Corporation)2 have been surveying the time taken to undertake a range of office tasks. Their latest analysis indicates that, on average, an office worker spends 9.5 hours a week searching for information, but, of this time, 3.5 hours is wasted in not being able to find the information required. As a result, either this information has to be recreated or a decision must be made on the basis of inadequate information.