What Is Information Management (IM)?

The more information you have, the better your life is. The less information you have, the more you miss out on all the fun stuff. Information management is a process that helps us collect, store, manage and maintain all that excellent stuff in a way that makes it easy to find when needed. It also allows us to share that information with others so they can benefit from it even if they don't live near us, work in the same department, or even on the same floor! Information management is often associated with collecting, maintaining, and sharing data to meet the needs of a company's stakeholders and customers. Stakeholders often include investors, partners, suppliers, and other groups vested in the organization's success. Information management is also closely tied to information governance, a set of policies and procedures that dictate how information is utilized throughout the organization. Information governance usually includes information management, but it also deals with information security, adherence to regulations and standards, and other critical aspects of business continuity. Information governance enables organizations to make smarter business decisions by providing a centralized framework for managing information throughout the organization. Information management is like a big plate of spaghetti. It's all tangled up in there, and it's hard to know where one piece starts and another ends. You can't just pick up one strand of information and say, "this is what I need." It's all connected—and that makes it hard to deal with. But there are ways you can untangle spaghetti. You can start by figuring out what kind of information you have and how much of it; then, you can figure out who needs access to what type of information and how often they'll need to access it. Once you have those answers in hand, you can start getting organized!