Information literacy has become heavily reliant on the scholarship, practice leadership model. At the heart of every scholarly endeavour is the goal of helping an individual find their skills and experience that is necessary for explaining, predicting and enhancing organizational performance. Scholar-practitioners are instrumental in assisting conduct research, aid in the enactment of policies and more importantly assist the organization to develop effective decisions. This essay attempts to address the role of information literacy in scholarship, practice and leadership in business communication. The world of business is primarily concerned with the basic use of information literacy with the goal of achieving company or organizational goal.
Scholarly Background vs. Leadership Skills
An effective business communications manager or leader heavily relies on establishing performance and professional bases relations with his or her team players. In this case, therefore, such a leader should constantly be engaged in the process of gathering, distilling and translating various forms of knowledge for the ease of comprehension by the team members or organizations. Central to effective leadership is the ability to develop a clear and concise vision to guide their practice. A clear vision is essential in helping eliminate competing interests between leadership and scholarly practice. The absence of a scholarly background for a leader often means that they are limited in terms of exploring evidence-based approaches and strategies that enhance organizational performance (McCaslin, 2017). In this case, therefore, information literacy can be looked at a vital element in helping a leader to gather, analyzes and utilize existing information to shape organizational strategies and approaches. The absence of leadership skills for scholar-practitioners introduces a challenge of its own, in that the individual becomes limited in terms of developing innovative and effective decisions for an organization. A business communication scholar-practitioner lacking leadership skills is likely to have difficulties in managing organizational diversity as well as providing corporate guidance. In this case, therefore, they will experience significant challenges in effectively addressing the needs of various organizational stakeholders. Information literacy comes in handy in such a situation, in that it helps in enhancing the job skills and knowledge. Access to Information Literacy Materials Access to information literacy materials is the greatest determinant in the advancement of research and training. The contemporary business communication environment is riddled with an insufficiency of instructors that can provide training to upcoming business professionals. The tremendous strides being made in the world of information technology have significantly revolutionized how people access information literacy materials. Previous, conventional approaches were limited to libraries and mass media tools like the television and the radio. The contemporary information literacy environment, on the other hand, is characterized by a great deal of internet usage that allows access to both public and proprietary databases (Decarie, 2012). Information literacy in the contemporary environment has thus been greatly enhanced through information communication technologies, an element that needs to be leveraged efficiently by scholars.
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Relation to Information Literacy
One of the best examples of the importance of information literacy is the completion of this particular assignment. In developing this paper, proper research and analysis have to be conducted with a keen eye on the most efficient and beneficial material available. The SPL model is firmly grounded on information literacy since the entire learning process entails the gathering, analyzing, translating and interpretation of information to bring about new knowledge and skills (Russell, 2009). Proper decision making in all aspects of life is reliant upon a person's ability to access and evaluate their environment to be able to discern any challenges or opportunities within that particular environment. It is also worth noting that in a world that is ever-changing, education and professional practices have to be looked at lifelong endeavours. In other words, it is important to cultivate a culture of constant and frequent knowledge and skill improvement (Turusheva, 2009).
Conclusion
The comprehension of the scholarship, practice and leader model is vital in helping individuals look at education and learning as a lifelong process. In this case, therefore, individuals can use information literacy in improving both their personal and professional lives. Ideally, information literacy and the SPL model are different sides of the same coin. The SPL model is obsolete in the absence of information literacy. In every part of the learning process, an individual has to engage in, research, analysis and information retrieval. A synthesis of the information provided in this paper points towards the fact that effective leadership is founded on the characteristics of a scholar-practitioner. The gap is however extant in regards to the development of scholar-practitioner-leader as evidenced by the lack of business leaders and professionals who lack the information competence due to inadequacies in research skills. One of the greatest challenges that the contemporary scholarly and leadership fraternity faces is in regards to information evaluation. The ease and efficiency of information access that has come about as a result of information communication technologies do present the challenge of integrity and validity of information literacy materials. In this case, therefore, while the process of information access is highly efficient, scholars are tasked with ascertaining and discerning the validity, quality and relevance of the materials that are available. On the upside, however, leveraging information technologies in contemporary society can be one way through which more considerable success can be realized in terms of developing scholar-practitioner-leaders.
References
Decarie, C. (2012). Dead or alive: Information literacy and dead (?) celebrities. Business Communications Quarterly, 72(2), 166-172. doi: 10.1177/1080569911432737. McCaslin, M. L. (2017). The Scholar-Practitioner-Leader: An Introduction. University of Phoenix. Retrieved on 22 December 2017, from https://research.phoenix.edu/blog/scholar-practitioner-leader-introduction. Russell, P. (2009). Why universities need information literacy now more than ever. Feliciter, 55(3), 92. Turusheva, L. (2009). Students' information competence and its importance for life-long education. Problems of Education in the 21st Century, 12, 126.
