Not being a morning person, I was unsure whether a networking breakfast would suit me, but the recruitment agent Sue Hill’s event offered good food and interesting conversation, so I thought I would give it a try. I wasn’t disappointed – the food was excellent and the big round tables promoted lively group discussion.

We were a mix of information professionals from public and private sector, at different stages of our careers, but three key themes prompted the most debate.

Change management

Managing technology change and bridging the cultural and political divisions within organisations in order to bring about change were key concerns. Information professionals can contribute by explaining how new technologies work, how technologies can be catalysts of changes in behaviour, and how they mitigate or increase informational and archival risks. Even simply letting people know new technology is out there can be hugely valuable. Knowledge and information workers can help manage change on political and cultural levels by understanding the corporate culture they are working in and helping their organisation to understand itself and so make good decisions about systems procurement. Information professionals can also often help to break down cultural barriers, to sharing information, for example.

Social media

Social media are now being used to differing degrees within organisations – some having embraced the technologies wholeheartedly, others seeing them as a problem or a threat. There was a general concern that technology is being adopted and used faster than we can understand its impacts and devise strategies for mitigating any risks.

Personal and cultural understanding of the divisions between the public and the private seemed to be a problematic area. Young people in particular were perceived as being vulnerable to “over exposure” as they seemed not to notice that postings about them – pictures especially – would remain available for decades to come and could compromise them in their future careers. Recruitment agents use social media to find out about potential job candidates, and notice inconsistencies between a very professional image presented in a CV or at interview with a Twitter feed that paints a picture of carelessness, foolishness, or irresponsibility.

Information literacy

Awareness of how to use and abuse social media, search engines and research tools, and data and statistics was seen as an arena in which information professionals can offer advice and mentoring, to young people, but also to organisations. Information professionals should also set good examples of how to use social media tools, adopt new working practices, and evaluate new technologies. They should also be able to explain how search engines work, what the pitfalls of poorly planned or too narrow research strategies are, and how to research in a more efficient and effective manner.

A new area that information professionals also need to understand is data analytics and how statistics and algorithmic data mining can be used or abused. Information professionals need not be advanced mathematicians to contribute in this area – an understanding of how to interpret data, the political and cultural issues that can bias interpretations, how to frame questions to get mathematically and statistically significant results, and how to understand the importance of outliers and statistical anomalies are skills that are becoming more important every day.

Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed being woken up by such thoughtful and interesting breakfast companions and went about the rest of the day with a head full of fresh ideas.