Data, Information and Knowledge

Although these three terms have different meanings, they often get mixed up and misused in our everyday lives, even in organisations where it should matter a lot seeing as data, information and knowledge are the building blocks of organisations. Many attempts have been made to define these three terms but some of these definitions do not quite capture the essence of these terms. Anthony Lieu (2007) pointed out that although many of these definitions are relevant, they are far from being complete. The following definitions were given by Anthony Lieu (2007), in his article called “Understanding Data, Information, Knowledge and their inter-relationships”. These definitions as we will come to see are in line with what T.D Wilson and Dick Stenmark came up with.

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Data: signals or reading that are recorded, captured and stored
Information: a message that contains relevant meaning, implication, or input for decision and/or action.
Knowledge: cognition or recognition (know-what), capacity to act (know-how), and understanding (know-why) that resides or is contained within the mind or in the brain

Earlier conceptions of data, Information and knowledge were that data was transformed into information and information is then transformed into knowledge. Definitions like this fail to take into account that at times knowledge is needed to interpret information and to create data out of this information Dick Stenmark (2002), he also indicates that data, information, and knowledge are interwoven and interrelated in more complicated ways. Kakabadse (2003) mentioned that the chain of knowledge is data-information-realization-action-wisdom. This is also not a good representation of “the chain of knowledge” as Dick Stenmark (2002) points out that this is not the case as the transition does not go the other way.

T.D Wilson’s (2002) definition of information and knowledge is quite similar to Dick Stenmarks’ in that he describes knowledge as what we know and information as when we express what we know be it in oral, written or whatever form, such messages do not contain knowledge, they contain information. It is then up to individual to understand this information and incorporate it into their own knowledge structure. Stenmarks’(2002) opinion is that knowledge is central and data and information are at the two opposite ends, he says if this focal knowledge is articulated into words then it is called information, he then says if this information loses its meaning so much that it becomes very distant from the knowledge required to interpret it, it is called data.

Stenmark (2002) gives an example using text. He points out that text itself is not enough to describe the knowledge to which it refers. He explains that the tacit knowledge of the reader must be compatible with that of the writer for them to fully understand the information.

I would also like to point out that what one person sees as information might be data to someone else. This problem arose when one of the groups giving a presentation on data, information and knowledge gave the example below. (This is not an actual representation of what they presented)

DATA ------------------------------INFORMATION

?? ....... .........- ?? ----- ----------------Name .......... Date of Birth
Mr A ............ 12/07/04 --------------- Mr A ............ 12/07/04
Mr B............. 23/09/98 --------------- Mr B ............ 23/09/98

They claimed that the table on the left was data and the one on the right was information. I pointed out that the figure on the right was exactly the same as that on left except it had been given context. They tried to explain that it might be information to them as the names and date had meaning to them. Although I was not convinced their representation was correct, I understood what they meant. To me it was still data but to them it was information. Or, it might be because my tacit knowledge was not compatible with theirs, I did not know for what purpose they would utilise the data or as they said information which is why we had different views. This just emphasises the fact that knowledge is required to interpret data and information.

After much contemplation, I believe data, knowledge and information are interrelated and each is needed to create the other. Information should be able to answer these questions for decision makers who, where and when. For example who should we target? Where should we market our products and when should do it. Knowledge on the other hand should be able to answer the how question. How do improve our products or services e.t.c.




REFERENCES AND BIBLIOGRAPHY
· Stenmark. D (2002). “Information vs. Knowledge: The Role of intranets in Knowledge Management” Proceedings of the 35th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences.
· Lieu. A (2007). “Understanding Data, Information, Knowledge And Their Inter-Relationships”Journal of Knowledge Management Practice, Vol. 8, No. 2
· Nonaka, I. and Takeuchi, H.( 1995.) “The knowledge-creating Company”, Oxford University Press, New York.
· Kakabadse. N, Kakabadse. A, Kouzmin. A.(2003). “eviewing the knowledge management literature”, journal of knowledge management.
· Wilson. T.D.(2002). “The nonsense of knowledge management”. Information research. Vol 8, No 1.