You're convinced that Competitive Intelligence is critical to any organisation? Very well, but your management might not share your opinion.
The first step is to come up with the right arguments to convince the undecided! To help you, we gathered some valuable tips and strategies to overcome resistance and reluctance.
First and foremost, it is necessary to demonstrate how CI topics are aligned with the progression of your industry, as well as part of your company’s strategic approach.
Regardless of the CI department’s reporting lines in the organization, it cannot behave as an independent agent. Rather, it should be a collective effort that solves business challenges and work hand in hand with other key business units to monitor, gather specific needs and build a suitable Competitive Intelligence plan.
Ultimately, the CI expert's objective is to provide the right information to the right person at the right time.
In addition to gathering and distributing relevant information, Competitive Intelligence experts must synthesise and analyse this information to identify and contextualise weak signals; to help upper management make strategic decisions.
Competitive Intelligence is at the crossroads of all the strategic functions that make a company.
A study by ABDS determined that while CI is mostly used for monitoring competitors (72%), innovation (63%) and changes in regulations (51%), it also addresses all key functions of a business.
Before presenting your Competitive Intelligence project to upper management, it is necessary to identify the KPIs and expected benefits, and to anticipate the precise amount of investment required to fully justify the cost/benefit outcome.
What kind of investments should your upper management expect? According to Digimind’s CI Practices’ Barometer, 90% of CI professionals agree that lack of time is the main challenge, followed by lack of CI personnel, at 71.8% Thus, the estimated expense for your project can be determined by:
In our CI Practices’ Barometer, CI experts indicated they spend between 15 to 17 hours per week searching for information on the web. Acquiring a professional CI software can free your team from repetitive, overwhelming tasks for higher valued tasks. Thus the benefits of procuring CI software offers advantages such as:
90% of CI professionals claim lack of time is the main issue encountered, followed by 71.8% who are experiencing a lack of personnel. Thus hiring CI specialists is another investment to consider when implementing a Competitive Intelligence project.
More and more organizations are hiring candidates with cross departmental skills, such as engineering and CI. Being familiar with the terminology and operations of the departments they will need to collaborate with makes it easier to understand their needs.
Expected benefits of Competitive Intelligence can be visualised in three stages:
In order to convince decision makers to invest in Competitive Intelligence, it is critical to elaborate a full plan that encompasses the roll out, deployment and steering of the CI project.
Here are the key elements to include in your presentation:
Highlight how your company benefits from a structured, strategic CI process:
Determine the deliverables, internal client groups, and frequency of your CI reports.
Determine the overall organisation of the CI department.
Who is this for? Determine how to clearly communicate the goals and progress of the initiative internally. Will it be through an annual activity report, catalog, internal user club, or a dedicated CI day?
Include the KPIs and objectives to evaluate your CI performance. Also state what the Project Success Indicators are for each objective.
To successfully implement Competitive Intelligence projects, companies need to understand that market intelligence is the foundation of collective intelligence. A CI department working in a silos will be unable to understand the business challenges to their full extent, or inform executive management on market trends. Consequently, they will not be synonymous with creating value or new growth.
Having a structured and logical plan of action complete with KPIs and project success indicators will provide clear direction and instill confidence when implementing Competitive Intelligence projects.
Don't miss out on Digimind's upcoming webinar where you can learn how to meet your organization's goals, create deliverables, and engage your audience. Register now while there's still time!