information ambidexterity: an exploratory case study of skills development

This article was downloaded by: [University of Kent]On: 26 November 2014, At: 15:13Publisher: RoutledgeInforma Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954 Registeredoffice: Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK

Journal of Information TechnologyCase and Application ResearchPublication details, including instructions for authors andsubscription information:http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/utca20

Information Ambidexterity: anExploratory Case Study of SkillsDevelopmentSharm Manwania, Mike Fishwickb & Gerry Rankinb

a Henley Business School, UKb Yell Limited, UKPublished online: 12 Sep 2014.

To cite this article: Sharm Manwani, Mike Fishwick & Gerry Rankin (2008) InformationAmbidexterity: an Exploratory Case Study of Skills Development, Journal of InformationTechnology Case and Application Research, 10:3, 39-55, DOI: 10.1080/15228053.2008.10856140

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/15228053.2008.10856140

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Information Ambidexterity: An Exploratory Case Study

INFORMATION AMBIDEXTERITY: AN EXPLORATORY CASE STUDY OF SKILLS

DEVELOPMENT

Sharrn Manwani Henley Business School, UK [email protected]

Mike Fishwick and Gerry Rankin Yell Limited, UK

Abstract Organizations face increasing challenges in managing their information despite the expansion in available technologies used to capture and exploit diverse forms of data. Managers want to make decisions based on the needed information not constrained by the available skills and technologies.

Yet, historically, information skills have been differentiated by the relative structure of the data. Technologies to manage structured data originated as programs and files evolving into applications such as enterprise resource planning and data warehouses. Unstructured data was previously managed in paper form by librarians and record managers. More recently, technologies to manage unstructured data such as content management, document management and search engines have become increasingly prevalent. An integrated information architecture needs to span both structured and unstructured data.

A hrther distinction in the management of information is that of control and exploitation. Historically the focus of information technologies and skills was more on control through operational databases. Exploiting information for strategic decision-making has been driven by technologies for both business intelligence and knowledge management.

Working with senior information executives, a tentative information framework was developed that combines these dimensions. The proposition is that information ambidexterity represents a target skills position for organizations. This paper explores the development of skills in an award- winning case organization and compares the results to the TM framework.

Yell has been on a six year journey starting with the appointment of a commercial data manager and reaching a position where it has acquired sound expertise in developing information governance, information architecture and information capabilities. This research analyses Yell's progress to establish what have been the critical skills for its information management journey and what recommendations emerge for other organizations. The results are evaluated in the context of the information management framework and proposals are made for further research.

Keywords: CIO, Information Management, Governance, Architecture, Capabilities

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INTRODUCTION There are many different definitions of information and Turnbull (2002) provides a hierarchic taxonomy that moves from bits and bytes to the popular model of data, information, knowledge and wisdom. His proposal was that an understanding of the science of information is critical to an organization's corporate governance capability.

This need to focus on information rather than technology is reinforced by many authors (for example, Smith & McKeen, 2007; Marchand, Kettinger & Rollins, 2000; Davenport, 1999). Yet in practice, information technology (IT) remains a central theme in the minds of executives. This is exemplified by the attention given to a controversial Harvard Business Review article titled "IT Doesn't Matter" (Carr, 2003) which expressed the view that large elements of information technology now merit the category of 'utility' and therefore are unlikely to provide a competitive advantage. While this may be true, a sharper focus on information rather than technology would undoubtedly reach a different conclusion.

This debate stretches into the academic world, with conflicting definitions of information systems. A relevant definition for this paper defines information systems as the science of information in organizations related to a study of the interaction of information with technology, people, and organizations (Palvia, 2008).

The need for integrated information In this paper we reinforce that the goal for analyzing the potential advantages for organizations should be 'information first, technology second' (Manwani 2005). Technology of course plays a vital role in capturing, storing and delivering information. Historically, it has been the processing of structured data that has taken prominence. Accounting was an early candidate for saving manpower by automating repetitive tasks. Adding financial numbers is an easier computing task than searching for unstructured content such as a unique address entered in different formats in multiple documents.

The degree of structure in information and systems is a recognized contingent variable for decision-making on solutions and skills. Gony and Scott Morton (1971) mapped the level of decision structure (structured to unstructured) to the level of decision-making (operational, tactical, strategic). Their view was that the required skills and management interventions were very different for structured operational decisions in contrast to unstructured strategic decisions.

In a similar vein, there are significantly different challenges in controlling information as opposed to exploiting it. The business transactions of an organization such as order processing and financial accounting depend on accurate data. Control requires validated records to be held securely with data that is ideally captured once at source and validated. Exploitation requires providing access to information to empowered users who are supported by the relevant analytical and sharing tools. Business intelligence and knowledge management have emerged as communities in this area albeit with different origins, technologies and capabilities. For example, business intelligence typically builds on structured operational data through extract, transform

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and load routines while knowledge management has a closer tie to analyzing large volumes of unstructured data and developing social networks.

We can categorize these areas into four different information worlds - structured control, unstructured control, structured exploitation and unstructured exploitation. Few information professionals have successfblly operated in all four worlds due to the different professional and technology origins. Librarians and records managers have typically operated in the unstructured world and IT staff in the structured world with little overlap. This is now changing with the increasing adoption of unstructured data technologies.

This evolution is important for managers and analysts who need to combine and analyze information from different sources. For example, establishing if a customer is satisfied with the service delivery will require information from all four information worlds.

i. Operational data to establish which deliveries are late ii. A review of documents to establish if any complaints have been received .

iii. Statistical analysis of service levels over time iv. Obtaining customer input on areas of satisfaction and dissatisfaction

This driver for information competency across potentially conflicting dimensions can be compared to the need for organizational ambidexterity in other areas. For example, there is the challenge to achieve a successful result in both flexibility and efficiency (Adler et al, 1999). Ambidexterity has often been applied to the need for extended innovation, contrasting and combining exploitation and exploration (O'Reilly & Tushman 2004, Lubatkin et d, 2006). In this next section, we propose a tentative information management framework that builds on a variation of this ambidexterity. Here, the drive for integrated control and data-based business decisions requires an 'information ambidexterity'.

A Tentative Information Management Framework We have identified the need to integrate the four distinct information worlds; these are largely driven by the technology that supports them and the heritage of skills and language of the people that have grown up in these worlds. This leads us to the information management framework in Figure 1 that was developed with senior information management executives from the Metropolitan Police and Yell, who are large information-intensive organizations respectively from the UK public and private sector.

Both organizations are founder members of the Information Management Profession (IMP) group which also comprises senior representatives from a number of organizations including the British Computer Society, Chartered Institute of Librarians and Information Professionals (CILIP), IBM, Gartner and Henley Business School. The framework was validated by IMP members as being a supportive tool for analyzing the information management skills in an organization. It has been used both as an analysis tool for developing information strategy and as a communication tool to inform senior business executives of where investments need to be made in information capability.

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Control

Exploitation

Structured Unstructured

Quality

Structured Exploitation

Structured Control (Data Processing)

Figure 1: Holistic Information Management Framework Source: Manwani (2007)

Unstructured Control (Document Management)

The relevance of the Information Management (IM) framework was further explored with a diverse group of information professionals at a focus group session held with the British Computer Society in April 2007. While there was discussion about the titles of the four quadrants, this group appreciated the clarity of message in the framework. The conclusion was that over-time the distinction between structured and unstructured will continue to blur yet the conceptual construct remains valid at this time.

Information quality is central to all four quadrants, originating in control and being critical to exploitation as highlighted in the information systems success model developed by DeLone & McLean (2003). It is vital that information is trusted, accessible and usable (Nicolau & McKnight, 2006). This highlights the importance of an integrated set of information management capabilities to deliver the required quality.

The following chapter explores the research on information management capabilities, the enablers for integrated information management and the implications for skills. Next the methodology is described which supports the exploratory nature of this research. Data on skills development are derived and analyzed from a longitudinal case of an award-winning information management department, managed by one of the authors. Finally, conclusions and recommendations lead to a discussion of further opportunities.

INFORMATION MANAGEMENT SKILL DOMAINS In this section, we review information management capabilities and the implications for skills development in relation to the tentative IM framework. We hypothesize that resolving the strategic issues of information management requires a strong partnership between the information professionals and the senior management in an organization. They need to work in harmony focusing on the development of key information capabilities.


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Information Capabilities Prior research on IT capabilities is one starting point to understand the positioning of information skills. In a review of information systems (IS) capability, Feeny & Willcocks (1998) identified nine core IS capabilities (ISIIT leadership, business system thinking, relationship building, architecture planning, making technology work, informed buying, contract facilitation, contract monitoring and vendor development). What is notable about this list is that it does not include any direct reference to information management, focusing instead very much on vendor management. The leadership and architecture planning capabilities are those that relate most directly to information management.

Subsequent research partly addressed the concerns arising from the focus on the IS function by defining six IS domains and 26 competencies across the organization (Peppard et al, 2000). These domains are: strategy, defining the IS contribution, defining the IT capability, exploitation, delivering solutions and supply. The list of competencies is a comprehensive list although it remains IT-centric since it again excludes information management as one of its domains. We can extrapolate that strategy and information value (contribution) are key executive topics.

If the IT capability research does not stress the importance of Information management, what other research domains can we explore? In contrast to capabilities, Gottschalk (2001) built on Mintzberg's managerial roles (Mintzberg, 1973) and identified the following characteristics important to a CIO: leader, spokesman, monitor, liaison, entrepreneur and resource allocator. Two additional IS leadership roles: functional technologist and organizational strategist were derived from six CSC roles (1996): chief architect, change leader, product developer, technology provocateur, coach and chief operating strategist. The importance of these roles was found to be contingent upon such factors as the degree of IS centralization and management maturity.

There is some overlap between the CSC roles and the five roles identified by Broadbent and Kitzis (2005) covering: vendor management, technology advancement, business enhancement, architecture development and IT leadership. These roles also partly align with those of Feeny & Willcocks (1998) and there is a similar focus in that they are considered critical to keep in-house even if other functions are outsourced. Again we see that architecture and leadership are key roles that relate to the management of information.

The conclusion from this review of research into capabilities is that there is little at the IS capability or leadership role that directly highlights the importance of information management. This significant gap needs to be addressed. For the purposes of this paper, we explore this gap from the perspective of the CIO who needs to consider the implications in terms of information strategy, leadership, value and architecture. In practice, we propose that information governance is required to integrate strategy, leadership and value. Together with information architecture, these capabilities cover the two skill domains that are relevant to a holistic approach to information management. This proposition is explored in the next sections through definitions of these domains.


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Information Governance We can extrapolate a definition of Information Governance from definitions of IT Governance. The IT Governance Institute defines it as: "A structure of relationships and processes to control the enterprise in order to achieve the enterprise's goals by adding value while balancing risk versus return over IT and its processes" Ali (2006). Alternatively, Weill (2004, p.2) defined IT governance as "specifying the framework for decision rights and accountabilities to encourage desirable behavior in the use of IT." The latter definition identifies the target behavior. Our definition of Information Governance (as opposed to IT Governance) is "a structure of relationships and processes, specifying the framework for decision rights and accountabilities toward information, so as to encourage desirable behavior in the use of information for achieving the enterprise's goals."

In a survey of information governance conducted with CIO participants in the US, there were several key findings.

1. 52% of total and 68% of larger companies had an information governance process. 2. 99% of internal structured data was covered by the process but only 36% of external

unstructured data. 3. 53% said that the majority of customer data they collected was unused. 4. Information security and privacy was covered in the Information Governance process by

83% of the companies but information quality only by 63%. Information Architecture and Structure was covered within 70% of the companies.

Source: The Big Payback from Effective Information Management (CIO Insight, 2006)

The survey data demonstrates that there is considerable scope for organizations to improve their focus on information governance and architecture, particularly in unstructured data. We can utilize the tentative IM framework to represent the key elements of information governance. Control management is consistent with compliance, risk and assurance activities. Exploitation is related to the alignment of information to business and organizational goals. This reinforces the need for information skills across all four quadrants.

Information Architecture The Information Architecture Institute (2006) provides several definitions of Information Architecture, which are described as being formative and having 'inherent ambiguity'.

1. 'The art and science of organizing and labelling web sites, intranets, online communities and software to support usability andfindability. '

2. 'An emerging community ofpractice focused on bringingprinciples of design and architecture to the digital landscape. '

3. 'The structural design of shared information environments. ' These three definitions demonstrate a different heritage. With such major differences in focus, il is a challenge for organizations to establish a consistent and shared approach to the developmeni of an information architecture. The first definition focuses more on a narrow definition of unstructured information from both control and usage viewpoints. The second of these definitions draws the analogy between physical and information architecture worlds, emphasizing common principles. The final definition emphasizes structure and sharing. It is the most concise and from


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the perspective of this paper, it is the most relevant of the information definitions, emphasizing structural design and the sharing of integrated information.

The IM framework highlights a key decision for the information architecture, which is how much structure there needs to be in the information collected and used by an organization. Structured information modeling of entities and relationships requires a different skill set than the unstructured information taxonomies favored by librarians. These elements of information architecture link control and exploitation across the structured and unstructured dimension and reinforce the need to cover all four quadrants of the IM framework

Summary IT managers have traditionally built their career on managing technology. Our first assumption is that information management needs to take precedence over technology management in setting and implementing policies. While this may seem a well-accepted conclusion by the academic community, the categorization of capabilities does not reflect this relative importance. Hence we need to extrapolate what are the key information capability domains that support a holistic approach to information management.

We conclude that CIOs need to ensure that the components of information governance and information architecture are aligned to the business goals. In support of this goal, they need to build the skills to integrate the different worlds of information management, arising from structured and unstructured data and the requirement to both control and exploit information. This has strong implications for information architecture. from a structural design and sharing information perspective and for information governance in relation to defining policies and management processes for decision-making.

Research Focus This research explores what skills are required by organizations to meet the managerial demands for integrated information management. Our proposition is that the target for an information- intensive organization is to build skills across all quadrants of the IM framework. A secondary objective is to establish to what extent the tentative information management framework is a useful tool to analyze the target skills.

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY An Explorative Methodology and Longitudinal Case Strategy Our aim is to use the tentative IM Framework as an aid to understanding the skills development in an organization. Given the exploratory nature of this research, we selected a qualitative case study with the primary aim of exploring key information management skills in a practitioner context and secondly, assessing the IM framework as an evaluation tool. The selection of a single case study aims for a depth of understanding.

"The critical questions seem to be ones of information management strategy .... one way of doing such managerial research is through case studies. They allow multi-disciplinary, integrative enqui ry... Longitudinal case studies therefore could be valuable if theory development is in part making sense offirms ' actions." (Earl & Feeny 1996:97)


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We believe that selecting an information-intensive organization as a case study with the IM framework supports this dual positioning of an integrative enquiry and a small step towards theory development through firther investigation of the IM framework.

Selection of Yell as Subject Organization Yell's mission is 'to be the best business information bridge between buyers and sellers, regardless of channel, time or location. Yell seeks to understand, anticipate and meet the changing demands of advertisers and users and to take advantage of new technologies and communication methods in the development of world-class products and services.' Source: Yell website - http:Nwww.yellgroup.com/englishlaboutyell

Given this strong business focus on information, we consider that Yell is an ideal case for an information management study. Further, Yell's information management group can be regarded as an exemplar by virtue of winning the 2005 International Information awards.

Research Design The majority of historical information presented in this case relates to Yell's submission for the 2005 International Information award, which was available for validation by the judges (On-Line Information, 2007). Since this is a longitudinal case, we deem that the perspective of the authors is an important factor. Two authors were senior managers in the information group throughout the period of the case study. This assists in generating deep insights through an action research perspective which collects data on business problems in an organization setting and helps to address the shortage of practitioner-focused research (De Luca et al, 2008).

Potential subjectivity concerns may be partly offset through the use of a conceptual IM framework that relates to the logical positivist standpoint of Yin's (1994) case study methodology and to the pre-structured case approach of Miles & Huberman (1994). The contribution of multiple authors also provides the opportunity for different perspectives. One author was the head of commercial data, a new position in 1999 that was set up to focus on information management as distinct from the head of information services who is accountable for the development of IT services and applications.

Developing information capabilities was a major goal from the start. The second author was a direct report focusing on information governance and architecture. These professional author contributions provide a unique insight into the development of the information management capability, governance and architecture at Yell during the period 2000 to 2007.

The final (and primary) author is an academic with a CIO background who supported the collection of data through observation, access to documents and multiple interviews for the award submission.

CASE DATA The following case description has been edited and updated from supporting material for the Best Information/Knowledge team won by Yell in November 2005. Statements of evidence supported


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all key points in this submission. This is a longitudinal case study and it covers three stages of information focus.

Stage 1 - Creating an operational structured information database Yell is a leading international directories business operating in the classified advertising market through printed, online and telephone-based media. Yell's brands in the UK are Yellow Pages and Business Pages, Yell.com and Yellow Pages 118 24 7 all of which are trademarks. Fundamental to Yell is its data which drives products, customers and processes. Data forms the core of the products and services supplied through the book, the phone and the net. Data supplies effective prospect opportunities to generate new customers for Marketing and Sales. Data is also the heart of business processes enabling efficient supply chain, administration and performance metrics.

Commercial Data (CD) was formed in 2000 with Yell's further recognition of the impact of poor quality data on organizational efic;ency across marketing, planning, sales and service. Yell's commitment to continuous improvement and quality is acknowledged through being the only company to win the European Quality Award twice under the auspices of the European Foundation for Quality Management. The Operations Director established CD in recognition of the growing importance of data to the future of the business and the need for a more integrated strategy. Its core data mission was to improve information quality by creating a professional competence in this area, working alongside IS and Change Management.

The organization's objective was to improve the value of information to the business through identifying data enablers for the marketing and commercial strategies. An initial information goal was to provide additional marketing data, particularly in the area of new prospects. This served two purposes because the same data could be used to support the strategy of achieving comprehensiveness in the book with a very high likelihood of the basic business information being available and it also served to create new prospect records to support the business's growth plans with the advertiser base. This latter opportunity was important to give credence to the team, as the value of the function was therefore visible by 'putting cash into the till,' which helped the credibility of other CD roles. To perform this role effectively required an interface with other business functions, which was achieved by creating Data Solution Managers who operated as data consultants and internal account managers. Their role was first to understand the marketing strategy and then to acquire and integrate the key customer data to enable the marketing plans to be realized.

One major challenge in any organization is to build systems and databases that are robust and flexible for the future. As a big user of SAP, the integrated enterprise package, this challenge is even more critical for Yell. Hence, the next step was to create a Corporate-Data Architect function to engage with the applications teams and develop a data architecture that would deliver best management practices engineered from inception. The team had to be able to work with the existing technologies used by the business, understanding their limitations from an information perspective and build compensating systems. A further goal was to introduce best practice when customizing the SAP environment to improve the data design aspect of the developers work.


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Borrowing from the tailoring industry, the Head of CD summarized this as 'measure twice, cut once'.

The building of this capability was vital for the biggest program Yell has initiated in the last five years; installing SAP as part of an enhanced business model. CD's role in effective data migration and design was critical. It included the consolidation of 3.5 million customer records from six operational databases. All this data needed to be quality checked with cleansing of the selected records. Alongside this migration, the data for the new system needed to be planned, mapped and signed off across the organization. Building on this successful effort, CD established a data management framework post-implementation as a key enabler of ongoing data quality.

Following the implementation of SAP a key learning point to be communicated to the business was that there is no perfect information world and that data can be corrupted simply through the processes of using it; in the SAP world the wrong master and reference data would impact every transaction the business performed in SAP.

Therefore the role of Data Steward was created to provide support to business users by investigating anomalies, correcting erroneous data and owning the process changes to prevent the problem recurring in the future. The insight the team has gained into the impacts that one change can make to the rest of the SAP applications has become vitally important to the organization.

In order for Yell to track progress, it was necessary to evaluate information quality improvements; hence the next action was to appoint Quality Analysts. These have a pragmatic role not only to measure quality but also to gain agreement on when it is good enough, otherwise in many cases there would be no end point to improving data. The team played a key role in improving the data quality of its customer base, for example by reducing duplicate customer records and improving postcode accuracy.

Stage 2 - Building on Unstructured information The challenges inherent in creating a holistic information architecture to manage across all sections of the IM framework are best illustrated by Yell's implementation of an innovative content management solution. Yell has vast content in printed directories. An opportunity was identified that required interpreting this printed ad content to support searchable on-line needs. This would allow flexible keyword access to be offered to users instead of a limited industry classification e.g., search for iPods rather than electrical retailers.

Content in printed directories is a mix of images and text effectively represented as bit maps. Hence, it was not possible to selectively repurpose the information into existing or new products for the benefit of advertisers and users. The solution required the development of a thesaurus of advertiser terms to be built from all advertisements across all channels and maintained in an appropriately designed thesaurus management system. This in turn needed to be linked to the search facilities on the Yell.com website.

A multi-functional team was created to address the opportunity comprising Information Services (IS), Yell.com search, a supplier partner and CD. Given the heavy reliance on data, the CD


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Solution Manager was appointed as the project manager with the Head of CD as project sponsor. The CD Solution Manager defined the requirements, scoped the overall project and developed the plan. The Corporate Data Architect designed the data and technology solution aided by IS and the organization's pre-press supplier. Once the data had been converted from bit maps into formatted content, the Quality Analysts did the reconciliation to confirm that the new data was usable, for example confirming that the URLs were valid. The Data Stewards owned the overall process by which the data was converted and made available to the business users that would exploit it.

Translating bitmaps is not a precise science. Deciding what level of conversion from image to text is feasible is dependent on the benefits and the effort involved. Stakeholder engagement was required to find a balance between commercial, design and quality issues. By working together on these areas, the CD team was able to present a pragmatic solution accepted by the stakeholders. CD professionalism was a big factor in gaining acceptance. The potential growth in applications was high but could not be specified in advance. CD had to make the investment in anticipation of the opportunities.

The results of the data conversion were made available to the business users together with consultancy support on the applications in a content repository. From here the first team to access the data was the thesaurus development team who built a thesaurus of terms based on what advertisers put into their advertisements. The data was linked at industry classification level and from the thesaurus the content repository was tagged with the terms. This closed the loop on the data and allowed for broader and related searches to be performed on the content repository. At this point, the Search team at Yell.com was able to implement Super Search as a capability for all Yell.com customers and users.

Further, Yell was able to build commercial intelligence into its advertising products. For example, the ability to capture all customers in London who use the phrase '24 hours' or advertised a Visa logo in their advertisements has created many product development opportunities. Data are now searchable which also allows unlawful words to be identified. Cross-selling opportunities emerged such as where printed customers use URLs in their printed directories but not on Yell.com. This data capability has enabled a multi million pound sales opportunity. A key sponsor commented that the solution 'transforms advertising content and unlocks the door to customer intelligence'.

This information management solution demonstrates the design and implementation of an integrated information architecture that spans both the structured and the unstructured data worlds and which supports both control and exploitation.

Stage 3 - Expanding Information Exploitation As a result of market demands and new programs, Yell is increasingly exposing its growing volume of data directly to its customers and suppliers. This significantly expands the exploitation of information although with consequential risks. Because of these market changes in its business model, Yell evaluated its organizational maturity in respect of information management. The head of CD used the IM framework to analyze the information capabilities for control and


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exploitation of information. Following a review with key functional leaders, Yell's next level of evolution in information management took the form of an Information Governance Group (IGG).

The foundation was the need to manage data across all dimensions of the IM framework, recognizing the diverse and conflicting needs for its data. Furthermore, meeting Yell's commercial objectives and legal obligations requires its data to be trustworthy, accessible and usable (consistent with findings from the literature review).

The IGG is a cross-functional business group accountable for the effective governance of Yell's information to ensure that it is fit for purpose and compliant. To achieve these aims, IGG has to be both proactive and responsive to demands for information governance. Further, it must deal both with the compliance and the strategic issues of governance, the balance of which is a debate that continues in the corporate governance world.

The IGG's accountability is delivered through the following three areas of activity. Strategic - Develop policies that ensure Yell's data is trustworthy, accessible and usable fiSom internal and external perspectives. Identify and gain commitment to data ownership. Align the producers and consumers of information with Yell's business goals. Tactical - Initiate and engage with change programs to improve the level of information capability. Justify and prioritize the implementation of agreed activities Operation - Design key performance indicators for data quality. Conduct audits for compliance with internal procedures and external regulations to mitigate commercial risks.

At one of its initial scope meetings, the IGG reviewed the spread of customer information across the four quadrants of the information management framework. This included customer master data, customer content, customer profitability and customer relationship data, each of which had its own information quality issues. Together, these elements supported a customer-centric view of information governance.

Case Summary In summary, Yell's information management group had a successful initial five years as a result of building its information skills alongside delivering business data solutions. This achievement was recognized in November 2005 with the award of best informationknowledge team in a commercial environment against tough competition. With its growing competence and credibility, Yell moved into the front-line Marketing area. Information management is recognized as a key enabler of Yell's e-business strategies. In particular, the aim is to provide a target data model that is consistent with the information principles. Yell has recognized the importance of a holistic approach to IM as exemplified by the IM framework. It has also understood the need for effective information governance and architectures to enable an information strategy that is aligned with the Yell business model.

IM FRAMEWORK CASE ANALYSIS Our proposition is that the target for an information-intensive organization is to build skills across all quadrants of the IM framework. How an organization reaches this point depends on the starting point and constraints. The previous chapter described Yell's development of information


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management skills over several years. We now evaluate the overall result in Yell against the holistic information management framework. This analysis focuses on the development of the capability required in both the structured and unstructured dimension, as well as the control and exploitation dimension.

Structured Control (Data Processing) The move from in-house, custom-built legacy systems to the integrated application package, SAP, created a major challenge for data management from both an information governance and architecture perspective. Business rules and process are the keys to effective deployment of an ERP with the data model and data management being a lesser consideration. The quality of master and reference data is vital in the management of ERP transactions. For every piece of poor quality master data there are potentially thousands of transactions with errors. Several objectives need to be met in managing in this quadrant. There is the data that needs to be controlled, including the reference data such as prices, product definitions and customer master, but there is also the activity type data which is created as a function of operating the system according to the business processes and operating rules. The role of Data Steward in Yell reflects the high process focus as well as the data focus of the ERP.

Unstructured Control (Document and Content Management) Yell's proposition is to connect buyers and sellers. The vehicle used to do this is content information contained in advertisements in printed directories or in electronic media like the Web and phone. Collection rules and processes allow for a high degree of creativity and design to enable customers to best represent their businesses. This means that the process is an iterative and creative one relying on advert content capture forms which sales people use to sketch out the design, with content and instructions to artists. Thus the content is not structured and in the first instance is not electronic. Yet the opportunities represented by effective management of such data are significant. There was a debate about the relationship between customer contact and content information recognizing that some data is reusable as both forms but not in every case. An example might be that in a structured world, the telephone number is the means by which Yell contacts its customer, but in the content world, a different, less structured piece of information allows the customer's customer (Yell's user) to contact the customer. The information competencies needed to leverage these unstructured data assets had to be developed without too much change to existing business processes, which had proven to be efficient and effective.

Structured Exploitation (Business Intelligence) Like all organizations, Yell runs most effectively when it has relevant management information to enable decision support and business intelligence. Acquiring such information required the development of data warehouses of customer transactions, including tools that produce reports for operational management. Yell invests heavily in this area especially in the tools, where it uses Business Warehouse from SAP to support the operational needs, SAS to undertake data mining and other products to put the core information on user's desktops. The integration of these solutions on a consistent data layer merged with the customer's content formed the platform for a structured database of information. This was critical to achieve the business drivers related to this quadrant, namely the ability to monitor performance and drive continuous improvement. The


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information management department required numerical analysis skills as well as core customer intelligence skills to deliver this capability to the business.

Unstructured Exploitation (Knowledge Management) Exploiting unstructured data includes management of the advertisements and developing strategies and plans for leveraging advert content. The evidence from this case demonstrates that Yell has an information need and competency in this quadrant. It is well illustrated through the development of a thesaurus, building a pre-press ripping process which converts the data to reusable structures and through the application of tagging processes to the content to give some information management to the data.

A competitive advantage then derives from developing exploitation through the organization's user community who can (without having to know the taxonomy) access the thesaurus and search for the things relevant to them rather than Yell's original business grouping of industry classification. Other knowledge areas come from the development of customer insight through linking the customer records from the ERP system to their ad content and identifying further commercial opportunities.

It can be seen that this is in many ways the most difficult of the four quadrants in which to achieve competency. This is due to the need to deal with less structured information and exploit both explicit and tacit forms of knowledge.

Information Quality and Overall Perspective The information quality challenges transcend all of the quadrants. Yell has institutionalized the measurement of ad content quality targets as this effectively represents quality of product. Getting an item of ad content wrong unfairly affects the customer's competitive position in his market and as such is high up Yell's agenda, but equally it needs to ensure that the core contact information with its customers is well managed.

As an information-intensive organization, Yell provides a rich source of data for an information management case study. In particular, this analysis has confirmed that Yell was able to build information skills across all four quadrants of the IM framework.

CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS Summary and Implications for Organizations This paper presents a rich longitudinal information management case which, in the authors' view, generates key insights into the development of information skills. The ubiquity of computer systems and the plethora of applications generating increasing data mean that the need to manage data from all quadrants of the IM framework continues to grow. Yell's challenge was to consider diverse types of information including content and contact data in a situation where users had very different demands of the same set of data. In line with the prediction of the IM framework, Yell decided to invest in creating the information ambidexterity required to help take the organization forwards.


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The view of the authors based on the feedback from members of the Information Management Professionals Group is that this is not a unique requirement. It is therefore recommended that organizations acquire skills and experiences that cross all dimensions of the IM framework and ensure the presence of effective communicators to engage the stakeholders so that these skills are best utilized.

The Yell team is fully integrated into the design lifecycle and is often the first port of call for problem resolution at a root cause level because of the insight the team has gained by dint of understanding the data. We consider that information brokerage skills are vitally important for organizations since they represent the interface between the data management and the commercial need.

Managing information in a holistic manner is a complex task requiring a range of skills across the four domains of data processing, document and content management, business intelligence and knowledge management. This paper has demonstrated how the information management framework can be used to illustrate the challenge for organizations in achieving an integrated view. As an example, it was used by Yell management to analyze and present the results of its information strategy.

This paper has described the journey of one information-intensive organization and highlighted success factors to build the new department with the right capability and to integrate it into the fabric of the organization. These steps were:

to identifjl and acquire data to suppoft commercial initiatives to deliver improvements to information quality to influence process change to maintain the improvement to provide insights for incremental commercial benefits

In making this journey, Yell has demonstrated achievement of a high level of information ambidexterity through strong information management leadership and multiple initiatives.

Limitations and Future Research Our goal was that the analysis should provide insights into the development of information skills in an information management group. We believe, by presenting data from an award submission that was backed by documentary evidence, that this offsets any potential bias from the case authors. The authors recommend further longitudinal research in other organizations to expand the data and provide a contrast to the experiences of Yell. In particular, we would welcome research into public sector and not-for-profit organizations to assess if the target skills framework applies and if so, to explore the pattern of skills development required to achieve the target. Similarly, it is necessary to examine industrial and retail cases to see if a holistic information perspective is as important for companies that, unlike Yell, deal in physical products rather than information-based products.

It is recognized that the concept of data structure does not represent a dichotomous variable (structured vs. unstructured). The proposed framework categorizes relative positions rather than being used to generate absolute values of structure. The same is true for control and exploitation, where data exists for both and overlapping purposes. While the framework may present an overly


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simplistic viewpoint, the case demonstrates that its use supports insightful discussions with practitioners about the holistic nature of information management and in particular, the need for information ambidexterity. This has been particularly evident with the Information Management Professional (IMP) group with major blue-chip organizations represented. We welcome further validation of this perspective.

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ABOUT THE AUTHORS Dr. Sharm Manwani is Associate Professor of Information Management at Henley Business School in the University of Reading. He previously held European IT Director roles at Diageo and Electrolux.

Mike Fishwick was previously Head of Customer Intelligence at Yell UK and has recently moved into a global role at a large multinational organization.

Gerry Rankin is Head of Information Governance and Architecture at Yell UK

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The authors thank the three reviewers for their thoughtful insights and constructive comments on an earlier version of this paper. Subsequent guidance from the Editor-in-Chief of JITCAR was particularly helpful in enhancing the paper for publication. In combination, this has provided a supportive review process.

JITCAR Volume 10, Number 3

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information ambidexterity: an exploratory case study of skills development

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