Chapter 9
Strategic and Managerial Decision-Making
for Sustainable Management: Factors
and Remedies for Information Overload
Geerten van de Kaa
Abstract In the past century, the amount of information that is generated has
increased at an exponential rate. As a result of this information saturation process
or ‘information overload’, people cannot keep pace with the information flowing
towards them. Organizations can take steps towards sustainability by improving the
health conditions in their organizations and the products they offer. One way to do so
is by trying to reduce information overload. Besides improving health conditions,
decreasing information overload also positively affects the quality of organizationallevel decision-making. This is a conceptual chapter in which propositions are built.
The determinants of information overload and the effect on decision quality are
described, and an extensive literature review is conducted. The chapter draws from
decision theory and the theory of human information processing and focuses on the
individual characteristics of decision-makers and the quality of the information
provided by the information system. Seven propositions are formulated and several
remedies for information overload are discussed. The chapter arrives at two determinants of an individual’s degree of information overload experienced (characteristics of the decision-maker and the information system), and it is argued that
information overload has a negative influence on the quality of decisions. These
concepts are combined in one model. The conceptual model is an attempt to provide
a better theoretical understanding of the concept of information overload. Finally,
contributions, limitations and areas for future research are discussed.
Keywords Information overload · Sustainability · Health conditions · Decision
quality
G. van de Kaa (*)
Faculty of Technology, Policy, and Management, Delft University of Technology, Delft,
The Netherlands
e-mail: g.vandekaa@tudelft.nl
© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021
J. Rezaei (ed.), Strategic Decision Making for Sustainable Management of Industrial
Networks, Greening of Industry Networks Studies 8,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-55385-2_9
161
Strategic and Managerial Decision-Making
for Sustainable Management: Factors
and Remedies for Information Overload
Geerten van de Kaa
Abstract In the past century, the amount of information that is generated has
increased at an exponential rate. As a result of this information saturation process
or ‘information overload’, people cannot keep pace with the information flowing
towards them. Organizations can take steps towards sustainability by improving the
health conditions in their organizations and the products they offer. One way to do so
is by trying to reduce information overload. Besides improving health conditions,
decreasing information overload also positively affects the quality of organizationallevel decision-making. This is a conceptual chapter in which propositions are built.
The determinants of information overload and the effect on decision quality are
described, and an extensive literature review is conducted. The chapter draws from
decision theory and the theory of human information processing and focuses on the
individual characteristics of decision-makers and the quality of the information
provided by the information system. Seven propositions are formulated and several
remedies for information overload are discussed. The chapter arrives at two determinants of an individual’s degree of information overload experienced (characteristics of the decision-maker and the information system), and it is argued that
information overload has a negative influence on the quality of decisions. These
concepts are combined in one model. The conceptual model is an attempt to provide
a better theoretical understanding of the concept of information overload. Finally,
contributions, limitations and areas for future research are discussed.
Keywords Information overload · Sustainability · Health conditions · Decision
quality
G. van de Kaa (*)
Faculty of Technology, Policy, and Management, Delft University of Technology, Delft,
The Netherlands
e-mail: g.vandekaa@tudelft.nl
© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021
J. Rezaei (ed.), Strategic Decision Making for Sustainable Management of Industrial
Networks, Greening of Industry Networks Studies 8,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-55385-2_9
161