Middle managers spend more than a quarter of their time searching for information necessary to their jobs, and when they do find it, it is often wrong, according to results of an Accenture study.
The proliferation of different information sources within organizations was revealed by the survey as the most important reason why managing information is proving difficult.
Among the key findings:
- WASTED TIME:
- Managers spend up to two hours a day searching for information
- 42% said they accidentally use the wrong information at least once a week
- 57% of respondents said that having to go to numerous sources to compile information is a difficult aspect of managing information for their jobs
- NO VALUE:
- More than 50% of the information managers obtain has no value to them
- 53% said that less than half of the information they receive is valuable
- POOR MANAGEMENT:
- Only half of all managers believe their companies do a good job in governing information distribution or have established adequate processes
- 59% said that as a consequence of poor information distribution, they miss information that might be valuable to their jobs almost every day
- POOR FUNDING:
- Only 11% of finance and accounting managers
This sounds like a wild goose chase to me. Managers should have little if nothing to do with searching information, but with correctly handling it. Instead, they lose money and time, and have further issues with the ones handling the information they provided. There will be no cash advance there!