Let the Web work for you 

This morning I hurried over to the Doubletree Riverside for the Capital City Communicators spring seminar on “Using New Media to Engage Your Customers.”

I got there just in time to catch the tail end of Mark Danielson’s presentation on the new demographics of media consumption. (Full disclosure – IBR sponsored the event, and our publisher Rick Carpenter participated in a forum about how new media is changing the news business.)

Print isn’t dead. Neither is television or radio. But everything is shifting to the Web. People don’t want to sit down and watch a newscast or read a magazine cover to cover. They want the information that interests them to be easily available, and they don’t want to wait for it.

No news there. I’m part of the generation that’s shifting media consumption to the Internet.

That’s why I was discouraged when, during a break, I overheard a woman complaining to her colleague that if her employees are checking the Web ten times a day, then they’re not working hard enough.

Information workers don’t fit any traditional model for efficiency. There’s no measure for the number of widgets a knowledge worker can generate in an hour or a day. Today’s worker relies on shared information and collaboration to get the job done, or even just for some inspiration before returning to the task at hand.

Technology has also made it easier to process information. You don’t have to worry about missing that important e-mail when you step out of the office – your Blackberry will deliver it for you. Even a casual user of Google can use the search engine to instantaneously uncover public records relevant to a business, including competitor information.

Don’t assume employees who spend all day hunched over their laptop are idly surfing the Internet; it’s more than likely they’re just working smarter – which is good for your business.

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