Where does it end? How do you keep up with this information overload? It’s gotten to the point where I’ve had to start actually closing my system down. I love information. I’m an information junkie! I love teaching, learning, consuming, producing… I love it all. Imagine billions of people like me, though. How do we deal with all of it?

Gnomie Ken Goldstein, Ph.D., MCSE writes:

Aloha, Chris:

Although I don’t participate in any of your chat rooms or other social networks, I do read all of your newsletters. You’ve posed an interesting question, but I think you’ve grabbed the wrong end of the “stick.”

I’ve worked with computers since 1959, hold a doctorate in Systems Engineering, and my job frankly entails that I be an Encyclopedic Synthesist for my large client base. It pays very well, as my base hourly rate is $125, and that goes up fast when I’m solving specialized problems. But, like you, I have what appears to be an overwhelmingly immense quantity of data to ingest each and every day. I read 684 monthly trade publications cover-to-cover, many of which come out weekly, and I haven’t tried to count the number of e-mail based newsletters I receive. So how do I convert this waterfall into something that I can drink?

Well, the first realization I came to was that not quite everything is really applicable to what is important to me (i.e., paying my bills, enjoying my work, and having quality time with my family). So I sat down and brainstormed really hard for about a month, and finally came up with a list of what now includes 22 technologies that my experience showed were really the key services that my clients were willing to pay top dollar for. Of course this list has been modified a number of times since I first created it over 20 years ago, but following it allows me to concentrate on the core competencies that meet both my and my clients’ goals.

Second, I went back and took a second — and more modern — speed-reading course. My reading speed was already well over 2,200 words/minute from my original Evelyn Woods training, Chris, but I can now scan at nearly 10 times that rate with 92% accuracy.

Third, I developed a series of techniques both to store the incoming data that are valuable to me, and more importantly to locate it later. I’m not going to share all of my “secrets,” but a fast scanner and a search product called dtSearch both play major parts.

Fourth, my engineer wife and I developed what we call the PITA (short for “Pain in the Ass”) system that we apply to all our clients and prospects for services rendered. A reasonable client is one who has a good idea of what he or she wants, is willing to listen to expert advice, and who also pays our invoice on time; they get a PITA factor of 1.00. A client who doesn’t know what the problem is will listen only infrequently to advice, and/or who doesn’t pay responsibly gets a factor between 1.5 and 2.0. And a prospect who has no clue what he wants, just wants to babble about his woes, and pays only when our lawyer contacts him may get a PITA factor of 3.5. By the way, the PITA factor is the multiplier for my base hourly rate. In short, if I can’t enjoy what I’m doing, someone else is going to pay for it!

Last, I schedule family time and fun things first. Chris, I know that many of my friends who work in similar fields never seem to have the time to enjoy living out here in Hawaii. So if I want to take my granddaughter out snorkeling in Kaneohe Bay or help on a Rotary project, I put it on my schedule, and let the work flow around those important things.

Once you choose to do something similar, you’ll find — as I did — that the “information overload” isn’t really an overload at all, because you’re the one who has set your priorities!

Keep up the interesting newsletter.