The overemphasis of social systems to the detriment of needed technical changes also militates against hybrid technical-social changes to effectively deal with information overload. Inherent in Blair's explanation of the difficulty in accessing and reading electronic records with obsolete hardware/software is the organizational practice of relying on humans to compensate for those obsolete systems (Blair, 2010). Some organizations force employees with unavoidably limited resources, including but not limited to money, time, staff, energy and other assets, to compensate for outdated technology. As Blair's article illustrates, technological changes must keep pace with increasingly dramatic influxes of information in order to adequately collect, sort, store, select and summarize that information (Blair, 2010). Ignoring the necessary technical element of organizations leads to purely social/human solutions that are inadequate to solve an organization's information problems. Research and examination of organizational dynamics shows that the human-machine relationship should be thoroughly considered when dealing with information and that the problem of information overload is better solved through changes to both technical and social systems.

3. Conclusion

Organizations are likely to find better solutions to information overload through changes to both their technical and social systems. Technical systems should be repeatedly assessed and upgraded as often as practicable to handle information and minimize its overload. In addition, as the flood of information continually rises, new and better technical tools for collecting, sorting, storing, selecting and summarizing are vital for handling that information with unavoidably limited resources, including but not limited to money, time, staff, energy and other assets. Furthermore, purely technical changes in an organization's systems cannot cure or replace some human factors vitally affecting an organization. In the face of an organizational problem, the mere introduction of new technology ignores the "two-way relationship between people and machines" and may fail to solve or even exacerbate the problem because it does not account for both negative and positive human...

Pure technology cannot adequately compensate for failings in humans and in their management and cannot replace positive exclusively human qualities such as judgment and wisdom. Certainly, there are arguments or at least practices disagreeing with the need for changes in both technical and social systems to handle information overload. The inadequacies of exclusively technical changes or exclusively social/human changes for dealing with information overload are clearly set forth in the course's required readings. Ignoring the necessary social/human element of organizations leads to technical changes that are inadequate to solve an organization's information problems. On the other hand, ignoring the necessary technical element of organizations leads to purely social/human solutions that are inadequate to solve an organization's information problems. Consequently, the human-machine relationship should be thoroughly considered, as the problem of information overload is better solved through changes to both technical and social systems.
Works Cited

Bellinger, G., Castro, D., & Mills, a. (2004). Data, information, knowledge, and wisdom. Retrieved April 21, 2013 from www.systems-thinking.org Web site: http://www.systems-thinking.org/dikw/dikw.htm

Blair, a. (2010, November 28). Information overload, then and now. Retrieved April 21, 2013 from chronicle.com Web site: http://chronicle.com/article/Information-Overload-Then-and/125479/?sid=cr&utm_source=cr&utm_medium=en

Errey, C., & Liu, X. (2006, February). Socio-technical systems: There's more to performance than new technology. Retrieved April 21, 2013 from www.ptg-global.com Web site: http://www.ptg-global.com/PDFArticles/Socio%20technical%20systems%20-%20There's%20more%20to%20performance%20than%20new%20technology%20v1.0.pdf

Green, P. (2010, August 16). Social media is challenging notions of the data, information, knowledge, wisdom (DIKW) hierarchy. Retrieved April 21, 2013 from www.cmswire.com Web site: http://www.cmswire.com/cms/enterprise-20/social-media-is-challenging-notions-of-the-data-information-knowledge-wisdom-dikw-hierarchy -- 008320.php