Coping with Information Overload

Jason Jackson, PhD

Books are beautiful things. When you open a book, it can be either a time machine or a time capsule. You get to choose whether it transports you to another time or place, or instead delivers a snapshot of life at a particular moment, frozen in time. I can remember the exact moment I first opened Future Shock and read the words, core to my own scientific research pursuits, “information overload.” Alvin Toffler wrote them, now 50 years ago, for the very first time in human history. In 1970, this was a new idea being born, one that we now clearly see as a trend that has shaped the experiences of the last several generations and will likely increase in influence over the next 50 years. It is also notable that at the time of Toffler’s writing, he had made a connection between information overload and what we would now term post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), having observed a similar phenomenon in military service members returning from the Vietnam War.

In my research, focused on leadership and coping with information overload, participants were chief executive officers (CEOs), company presidents, and top directors of diverse businesses and organizations. The essence of my research was determining what types of coping mechanisms the very top leaders use to succeed, to overcome conditions of information overload and make effective leadership decisions. This was an open-minded journey, and I started it with no concept of how many coping mechanisms would emerge, nor what their core utility concepts would be. In addition to the real-world participants, I also researched literature, as far back as the late 1890s. With each book I opened, I asked, as if of a living person, a simple question: “What coping mechanism do you use to overcome information overload?”

This effort identified 16 coping mechanisms to combat the impact of information overload upon senior leader decision-making. They are outlined as elements within the Grounded Theory of Information Overload Executive Coping Mechanisms. Each mechanism has value, and it is interesting to note that each of the real-world leaders used at least one of the mechanisms once, and none of the elements fell off the menu of choices from lack of use. Additionally, the literature review found the exact same 16 coping mechanisms, even over its extensive span. No item noted failed to appear, and no additional item emerged beyond the 16 noted. This was a powerful parallel and strengthened the validity of the findings.

People often ask which is the most powerful coping mechanism, or the top two or three, to overcome information overload and make effective decisions. Interestingly, even when asked to select a single most effect element, over two-thirds of senior leaders still responded with a compound answer. The most effective mechanism is a two-part process, in which Prioritization = Categorization + Filtering.

Consider the simple task of placing items by category type in color-coded folders, and then deciding you will deal only with the red folder items today. You have categorized items via an act of color-coding, and then made them your priority for the day by filtering to red folder items only. The second-most powerful coping mechanism was simply the traditional managerial act of taking control.

The other mechanisms have merit, and in contexts other than business leadership, or senior leadership decision-making, they may have more value. One of the least reported and utilized mechanisms, tacit knowledge, wherein Tacit Knowledge = Academic Knowledge + Experiential Knowledge, may increase in value for professions such as first responders, in which knowing a profession, and story-telling or mentorship, are key elements of learning and professional success.

What is ahead these next 50 years? Two powerful trends that will be elements of our new reality are automation and artificial intelligence (AI). Efforts to develop near-human thought processes have spanned hundreds of years, from ancient automatons that processed and prayed daily prayers for royalty to cloud computing implementations in place today. Automation is growing rapidly as computer programming skills become a basic foundational professional skill and we learn the concepts of systems theory and quality management; we can effectively code repetitive tasks into automated processes. AI is more complex. The idea is that it learns on its own, and adapts, via heuristics and learning models, even extrapolating beyond the outlines used to initially teach it. The main conversations on automation and AI are that they will change the world significantly, that potentially, entire professions will be replaced and their workers displaced, out of jobs. Economists and politicians debate the potential future requirement, as a basic human right, of a universal basic income. That would indeed be radical change should it occur.

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We may not be able to control all elements of how the future plays out, but we can become better prepared. It is painful how near-obvious this statement is, but since little effort is being invested in the idea, it is worth stating. We can do better!

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A separate question is what the role of AI will be in relation to humanity. Will it replace us? Or, alternatively, will it augment us? Will the choice between these branches of the future even be ours to make? These are important conversations, and we want a voice. We also need a strategy of implementation, versus being forced by lack of anticipation and preparation into crisis management once real-world events force our hands. The rate of change, and the rate of technological implementation, will continue to surprise us, to speed up, in a pattern more exponential than linear.

We may not be able to control all elements of how the future plays out, but we can become better prepared. It is painful how near-obvious this statement is, but since little effort is being invested in the idea, it is worth stating. We can do better! Imagine a world where we taught children, from kindergarten to high school graduation, not only the mechanisms of success, but also the parallel role of coping when things go wrong. Leaders need to provide a vision and a vector, to build culture and to make decisions. If they are stellar at the first three yet fail at the last—decision-making—they fail to turn thought into action, to earn positive results. So, increasing educational focus on decision-making and coping mechanisms, would increase societal return on investment. With proper educational investment, society would rise to new heights. Plus, when reality does not go as planned, we need to have optimized and practiced tools in our mental toolkit against adversity. Building better leaders should be our top goal, but this is about more than earning positive results. It is also about building in the resilience we will need when we do at times fail. Reality is not one-size-fits all.

Jason Jackson, PhD, is director of the Jackson Research Institute and a professor at Purdue University Global. Previously, Jackson was a Major in the United States Air Force, serving honorably for 15 years as an aviator and acquisitions expert in 65 countries during both humanitarian and combat operations. He is currently editor-in-chief of the International Journal of Responsible Leadership and Ethical Decision-Making (IJRLEDM). His research interests include information overload as experienced by senior leaders, as well as cognition, artificial intelligence, and military veteran leadership within businesses. Connect with him at www.linkedin.com/in/jason-jackson-phd.