Essential properties of information
We have figure out what need to be done to deal with quality information. Now let’s look at what it needs to be known and to be done to deal with valuable information. Along with quality the value is one of the 3 fundamental properties of information (quality, value, multiplyability).
Value of Information is a property of useful information reflecting its importance in comparison with others informations, depending on the importance of the decisions (or generated new information) made on the basis of this information. The importance of a decision or new information depends on the hierarchy of individual or organizational purposes for which this information is used in a given period of time.
To build the hierarchy of goals it is necessary to recognize the consequences of the decisions made as much as possible, and for this it needs to collect all available information that allows you to present these consequences in most detailed form. Often this is information about the past of the event or object, since many processes are cyclical.
Let me give you an example. Let’s say you are working on an important contract that your promotion depends on and you are waiting for information to complete it, i.e. at this moment it is most valuable information for you. Let’s say (God forbid) you receive the message that your child is seriously ill. Now most valuable information for you will be the information on how to cure him, and the value of information for the completing of the contract will move to the second level.
Similar examples can be given at other social levels: - at the level of an organization, association of organizations, society. For example, when you buy a commodity, valuable information is its expiration date since the health of the buyer (consumer) depends on it. However, the manufacture often does not realize it (or does not care), and the information about expiration date does not stand out from other informations and you have to search for it for a long time.
How these properties of information relate – the quality of information and the value of information? The relationship between quality and value of the information can be expressed in the following thesis: - not all quality information is valuable, and not all valuable information is qualitative. And if the first part of the thesis is clear, then the second part means that low-quality information also has value because it can also serve certain goals of the one who transmit it, for example, to disinform an enemy.
However, if we abstract from conscious use of low-quality information for any purposes, then we can say that low-quality information has negative value since the decision made on its basis or new information generated will cause harm.
Thus, the value of information we can divide into 2 types: - negative value and positive value in depending from sequences. If we use another criterion the value of information can be divided into direct value of information (DVI) and potential value of information (PVI).
Direct Value of Information is the property of information to be used for decision making and new information generating at the preset time.
Potential Value of Information is the property of information to be used for decision making and new information generating in the future by the owner of the information or other people.
Since the value of information is determined in each specific case, it is impossible to talk about quantitative measurement of the value of information. At the same time, from our point of view, based on the essential characteristic of information, the following patterns can be identified in relation to the value of information.
First, strategic information has greater value than other information. This follows from the fact the value of information is determined by the hierarchy of goals and other goals are subordinated to strategic goals.
Let me give an illustrative example. The goal of the “Monitor” project implemented in one the large Western corporations was to create software for monitoring work process at an assembly plant. The project involved end users who formulated tasks for the developers, taking the existed model of the General Motors corporation control system as a model. The developers coped with the task set perfectly. However, neither end users nor developers had known that corporation’s management decided to move from traditional process of monitoring of the work process to the fundamentally different system just-in-time control (founders are Japan corporations). After several alterations the developers came to the conclusion that it would be better to design the software directly to the just-in-time system [13, с.146]. Thus, if the developers and end users initially obtained by the strategic information, they would not have encountered such difficulties.
Secondly, metainformation with an adequate level of detalization has more value than the information included in it, since metainformation (if we consider a simple case) includes 3 informations: - information, comparable information and resulting information. This allows on the one hand, more complete describe the subject. On the other hand, as we considered above, this is an element of checking the information quality.
For example, let’s consider metainformation “as result of reserve requirements ratio cutting the 17 billion rubles release were predicted, and in fact the release was 18.2 billion rubles what indicates the high level of forecasting”. In this case we have forecast information, actual information and the result of comparison: “what indicates a high level of forecasting”.
Third, the more people, involved in certain decision making or new information generating have information needed for this, the higher its potential value. However, one condition applies – this information should not be used to the detriment of a person or organization. This pattern follows from the definition of potential value of information and such a property of information as multipliability, i.e. in this case the probability of new value information generating and making the most correct (effective) decision increase.
I will give an example of the third pattern. Harvard University professor Dorothy Leonard in her monograph cites results of a study of the set of companies, which showed that when new product is developing production engineers have lower status than design engineers, that often leads to the unforeseen problems when new product is launching into production. There are many other examples when lack of involvement or weak involvement of end users of the product leads to the failure of the project. In other words, if additional number of employees of the organization was involved in a particular project, i.e. they have received the same information as the involved employees, that information would have greater potential value since it would allow to generate additional valuable information and lead to the success of the project. Unfortunately, more than once in the course of my work I have deal with misunderstanding of this pattern by the management. I guess this is because the possession of exclusive information makes some people more significant in their own ayes.
When considering the third regularity, the third fundamental property was mentioned – multiplyability. Multiplyability of information is property of an information that reflects its ability not to be alienated when transferred to other person. This property is best illustrated by the words of Bernard Shaw: “If I exchange apples with someone, we will each have one apple, and if I exchange ideas with him, we will each have two ideas”. The word “transfer” we should be understood in the broadest sense, in the sense that it can take place without tour knowledge, i.e. if someone copies your information you may not feel it, i.e. you will not know it. In my opinion it was the fundamental property that was underestimated (not taken into account) developed Western countries when they began to massively transfer their production to China.