MAPPING CORPORATE BRAINPOWER

摘要

Between September 5 and 18,1995,39 messages went up on the FORTUNE editorial staff's QuickMail bulletin board. Nine were "Does anyone know...?" questions. A typical posting begins: "Anyone out there have an expert or two to throw my way?" Six more were "Does anybody have ...?" questions, half concerning a missing reference book. (The miscreant put it back.) Thus 15 of the 39 messages (38%) were requests for information—a minidatum that doesn't begin to tally how often in that fortnight my colleagues and I sent private E-mail questions, queried the library, stopped one another in the hall, rummaged through files, or otherwise scavenged for knowledge that the organization already has.