Connecting People with Information
From National Geographic to the FBI, Lenny Williams ’06 M.I.M. has made a career of connecting people with information.
After graduating from the iSchool’s master of information management program, Williams parlayed his interest in online networking and community building into a newly created position with the National Geographic Society. There, he provided project management and technical support for the organization’s Emerging Explorers program, which recognizes and supports talented young adventurers, scientists, photographers and storytellers worldwide.
Within 18 months, Williams made a lateral career move, assuming a leadership role in National Geographic’s All Roads film project.
“I managed the technical media platform and global outreach for indigenous and underrepresented filmmakers to bring their storytelling to a much wider audience,” Williams says.
The training he received at the iSchool was invaluable, Williams says. “The key is being able to filter information and present it in a way that people are going to be able to make the best use of it,” he says. “The iSchool allows you to specialize in that.”
Williams says his interacting with other iSchool students working in different areas of information management—whether technical support, library science and information policy—helped to broaden his horizons immensely, saying, “I am still in touch with a lot of them today.”
Williams now works at the Federal Bureau of Investigation, acting as an intermediary between the developers of new information-driven tools from the bureau’s information and technology branch and the people who use them.
“I filter the technical information between the engineers and computer scientists and the end user,” he says. “By offering easy-to-digest guidelines, it allows our agents and analysts to make their jobs better and more efficient.”