Information overload among university of Nairobi MBA students

Abstract

Information Technology plays a very important role in enabling production, processing, storing and distributing huge amounts of information every day. Recent information technology has facilitated the exponential rate at which information is generated allowing information users to access too much information. Despite a lot of advantages realized from advancement of Information Technology in generating diverse information required for knowledge gain for academicians and decision -making for managers, the same technology has contributed a great deal towards Information Overload. Organizations, institutions of higher learning and students alike invest a lot of resources in terms of money, time and efforts to improve themselves but these are neutralized by Information Overload. The purpose of this study was to investigate existence of Information Overload among University of Nairobi MBA students focusing on the following four objectives of the study: To establish the causes of information overload to University of Nairobi MBA students, to determine if University of Nairobi MBA students experienced information overloaded and up to what extent, to determine the extent of Information Overload effect on University of Nairobi MBA students on their various activities and interactions and finally to establish strategies applied by University of Nairobi MBA students to combat Information Overload. This study adopted descriptive survey design where the target population was University of Nairobi 2700 registered MBA students. Simple random sampling technique was used to select respondents. The researcher used a questionnaire as the research instrument which was self-administered and collected back after completion by the researcher. Collected data was analyzed using SPSS frequency tables, Descriptive Statistics and Factor Analysis. The findings were presented using pie chart, bar graph, frequencies tables, percentages, Means and Standard Deviations. Study findings revealed majority of University of Nairobi MBA students were aware of Information overload and more than 90% of them experienced information to a great extent. It was also established that information overload affected majority of MBA students in executing their operations and interactions to a great extent. Further, the study revealed that some MBA students applied some strategies to manage information overload while others did not. From the study findings, the following recommendations were made: First, the University of Nairobi School of Business to incorporate an information literacy course to enable MBA students learn how to handle information, secondly, school of business MBA office to put in place information and communication policy to prevent unnecessary information overload to students.