Volume 2005, Issue 1
February 28, 2005

Information International Associates Gaining Public Recognition for Excellence

(reprinted with permission from the Oak Ridger )

What started as virtually a one-woman show back in 1988 has grown to a truly international information company with staff and projects working with and influencing information from Bangkok, Lima and Paris to Albuquerque and Arlington.

Information International Associates (IIa) has grown not only in size, but also in stature - gaining public recognition for excellence at all levels of the organization.

The company's vision to be recognized as the benchmark of excellence in information management by 2010 and its commitment to managing information as a strategic resource has led to a wide array of information projects, information technology infrastructures, base operations support, research and development (R&D) strategic planning, library and information center management, and education and training support.

Here in Oak Ridge, IIa operates the Department of Energy's (DOE) Information Center and provides information technology (IT) services to DOE's Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI). IIa is also the IT protégé for Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

At OSTI, IIa heads a team with NCI Information Systems which is so effective that the company is working to expand its support of DOE through Team IIa Oak Ridge, an IT services partnership IIa leads with NCI, ARTI and Raytheon.

At the Oak Ridge corporate headquarters, in addition to managing daily business operations, staff members coordinate programs for the U.S. Geological Survey, including the Southern Appalachian Information Node of the National Biological Information Infrastructure (NBII). Through her work for NBII, IIa President Bonnie Carroll has recently been awarded the Department of Interior's Conservation Award for her leadership in "making quality data for environmental decision-making a reality."

IIa is also in the library business, managing five Air Force base libraries, three technical libraries for NASA and the Air Force, and the cabinet-level library for the Department of Labor.

A natural outgrowth of the library and information business is supporting the training of librarians and information professionals. IIa does just that by managing the professional association of nearly 500 library and information science faculty members known as ALISE, the Association for Library and Information Science Education.

The company also provides open source business intelligence services, including medical infrastructure country studies for the Armed Forces Medical Intelligence Center.

Even as IIa diversifies into all areas of information - management, systems, and technology - the company continues to operate its very first contract, the management of CENDI, the Federal Scientific and Technical Information Managers Group (program managers and directors from 12 federal agencies which represent more than 95 percent of the federal R&D budget). It was for IIa President Bonnie Carroll's visionary management of CENDI that she received the prestigious Federal 100 Award from "Federal Computer Week."

It is through CENDI that IIa has been heavily involved with the development of Science.gov, the FirstGov portal for scientific information. It was also through CENDI that Carroll first met Internet pioneers Vinton Cerf and Bob Kahn - hom she brought to Oak Ridge for a community lecture in the summer of 2004.

Other acknowledgement of IIa's work in the industry came in 2004, with recognition of the company as one of the 50 fastest growing businesses in the state of Tennessee and numerous recognitions from the Air Force for individual and teamwork excellence at the project sites. The Education Center IIa operates at Eglin Air Force Base has consistently been named Best in Command since IIa took on its management three years ago. The IIa-operated library at Eglin has received five "Best in Command" citations.

In early 2003, IIa learned that its team's work at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center and with the CIO Office resulted in recognition as the Federal Library of the Year.

IIa continues to be a hometown company, active in such local organizations as Rotary and Altrusa clubs, the East Tennessee Economic Council, the East Tennessee Environmental Business Association, the Oak Ridge Chamber of Commerce, Leadership Oak Ridge, and the American Museum of Science and Energy. IIa scholarships have been established at the University of Tennessee College of Communication and Information and at Knoxville College.

IIa is headquartered at 1009 Commerce Park Drive, Suite 150. For more information, call 481-0388 or visit www.iiaweb.com.