Qualitative Research in Intelligence and Marketing: The New Strategic Convergence phần 10 pot

In addition, the audit should provide a “feel” for the organi-zation and the degree to which qualitative methods will be treated with respect.Ideally, adding new staff members with quali

The Qualitative Audit 221

If employees do not stay with an organization for long periods of time, the zation will not be willing to invest heavily in them

organi-4 Do clients feel that competitive intelligence is a set of techniques that can be routinelyapplied to any project at hand?

Although competitive intelligence is a complicated profession, this fact might not be obvious to the client If the client does not recognize the distinctiveness of competitive intelligence, it might appear that anyone with minimal computer savvy can perform the basic tasks of competitive intelligence professionals If so, the client and organ- ization will probably not be willing to invest heavily in competitive intelligence an- alysts

5 Does the organization believe that providing analysts with specific and long-termexposure to the subjects they research is a legitimate and expected cost of business?

If the organization believes that its interests are served by providing long-term and specialized training to analysts, it will be willing to invest Without this belief, it will not be willing to do so

Not all organizations are willing to invest in analysts in ways that allow them

to gain the expertise they need to most effectively do their job Because petitive intelligence involves applying intuitive and subjective analysis to a di-verse data set, analysts need a long-term and sophisticated exposure to thephenomena they analyze Unfortunately, some organizations are not willing toprovide this support When organizations do not, the competitive intelligencefunction suffers and their product degenerates

com-The responsiveness of clients and organizations to qualitative methods,therefore, is a key issue that needs to be considered Competitive intelligenceprofessionals do not live and work in isolation What they do and how they do

it will be closely tied to the orientations of their organizations and clients

INTERCONNECTEDNESS OF BOTH

While the two measures discussed above—(1) skills of analysts and (2) spect of clients—are independent, they are closely interconnected Thus, if cli-ents have little respect for qualitative methodologies, the people that theorganization has hired in the past will probably not be particularly strong in thatregard As a result, clients who have never been offered professional qualitativeanalytic services will probably not think of using them, and analysts who areseldom allowed to employ qualitative methods will not develop sophisticatedexpertise in that area; the cycle goes on

re-This is a cycle, however, that needs to be broken Competitive intelligencestaffs need to develop their qualitative toolkits and clients need to make use ofqualitative methods when they are appropriate If not, both the competitive in-telligence function and its clients will suffer

222 Operationalizing the Social Sciences and the Humanities

HIRING NEW STAFF AFTER AN AUDIT

Having completed a qualitative audit, it should be possible to assess if there

is a need to acquire additional qualitative skills by hiring individuals with itative expertise In addition, the audit should provide a “feel” for the organi-zation and the degree to which qualitative methods will be treated with respect.Ideally, adding new staff members with qualitative skills should be done intandem with efforts to help clients to recognize the benefits to be derived fromqualitative methods Hiring humanists and social scientists with the requiredabilities should be fairly easy because many skilled candidates with advancedtraining are underemployed The “care and feeding” of these atypical recruits,however, may be a challenge for those who usually deal exclusively with busi-ness school graduates and/or veterans of the private sector Nonetheless, therewards of doing so can be many

qual-UPGRADING STAFF AFTER AN AUDIT

“Upgrading staff” means taking the existing analysts and helping them togain the skills they need in order to more effectively employ qualitative methods.Some of this upgrading may include academic work In business schools, grad-uate courses in consumer research and marketing research may be particularlyuseful If courses on qualitative methods exist, they will be particularly appro-priate Other disciplines (such as education departments) are also striving toembrace qualitative methods and they might offer courses on qualitative tech-niques

Analysts may also want to go straight to the qualitative disciplines An thropological methods course would be a logical choice Various seminars inthe theory and methods of disciplines such as literary criticism would be appro-priate The fields of American studies and popular culture will also provide muchuseful information and valuable techiques

an-The goal here is to upgrade the qualitative skills of researchers in order totake full advantage of qualitative techniques In many organizations, qualitativemethods have not been emphasized As a result, the qualitative skills of analystswho work within such organizations have, no doubt, atrophied Nonetheless,these are proven professionals and they may merely need an injection of state-of-the-art qualitative methods to return to peak form

CONCLUSION

In order for competitive intelligence professionals to understand the degree

to which qualitative methods are a vital part of the organization, assessing alysts’ skills and determining the degree to which the organization respects qual-itative methods must be considered By addressing these questions, it is possible

an-The Qualitative Audit 223

to conduct a qualitative audit that measures the situation within a particularorganizational setting

Once the audit is conducted (formally or informally), analysts will be in aposition to plan a course of action that may include upgrading skills and groom-ing clients so they can better appreciate the benefits of qualitative research

REFERENCE

Eddy, Elizabeth M and Partridge, William L (1978) Applied Anthropology in America.

New York: Columbia University Press

Epilogue: The 10 Percent Edge

Qualitative methods in business will probably always constitute but a fairlysmall percentage of the total research efforts which are conducted when seeking

to understand customers, competitors, and collaborators These statistics, ever, should not lull us into underestimating the importance of qualitative re-search Due to the fact that qualitative research is often not appropriately andprofessionally pursued, its relevant and strategic use can easily emerge as the

how-“wild card” of competitive effectiveness

Most organizations are skilled in gathering and assessing scientific and titative data As a result, these tools, being universally available, do not provide

quan-a distinctive competitive edge to those who hquan-ave mquan-astered them Although theorganization may be handicapped if it lacks scientific and quantitative researchskills, it will also be at a disadvantage if it has not mastered qualitative methods.Organizations that are skilled at using qualitative methods, however, may findthat they do enjoy a distinct advantage because many of their competitors, cus-tomers, and collaborators have not learned to use these techniques and, therefore,they will not be in a position to benefit from the insights they offer

The reader may rebut that qualitative intelligence may only account for 10percent of the data that is used to make decisions, but if an athlete loses afootrace by a 10 percent margin, the defeat is devastating The same is true ofstrategists who miss 10 percent of the information that they need when makingdecisions

Appendix 1

The Use and Abuse of Warfare

and Sports Analogies

Warfare and sports analogies are among the most seductive metaphors used inthe business world The basic orientation of these illusions is to equate theconflicts an organization faces with warfare and athletic competition In terms

of game theory, warfare and sports constitute what may be considered to be

“zero-sum games”; the goal is victory and the only way to achieve it is for thecompetitor to lose

Certainly, circumstances exist where the zero-sum game model legitimatelydepicts the relationship between an organization and its competitors, and manyoccasions exist where warfare and sports analogies that are hinged around win-ning and losing are appropriate analogies by which an organization can viewitself and its predicament

Many organizational leaders, furthermore, are comfortable being compared tomilitary warlords or sports heroes, and the strategies of combat may parallel thetactics that businesses use when they struggle with competitors Certainly, war-fare and sports analogies have their uses

Nonetheless, these analogies can be abused or overworked A basic limitation

of warfare and sports analogies is that they draw attention away from the factthat, strategically, organizations basically exist to serve, not to compete Provid-ing goods and services that customers and clients want is the most essentialessence of strategy; other decisions are, in the final analysis, tactical Organi-zations and their leaders need to remember this profound truth

It is useful to juxtapose the warfare/sports analogy with the perspectives(stemming from marketing) that organizations exist, primarily, to serve Focus-ing around clients or customers draws attention to the most basic strategic de-cisions that organizations must make In addressing this perspective, specificissues need to be discussed They include:

228 Appendix 1

1 The Nature of Strategy

2 The Primary Goals of Organizations

3 The Key Tactic Used to Achieve the Strategy

4 Measures of Success

In the discussions to follow, the warfare/sports paradigm will be juxtaposed withmarketing perspectives that center upon service, not competition

THE NATURE OF STRATEGY

Those who embrace warfare/sports analogies think of strategy in terms ofcompeting against a rival To these people, competition is the main strategicconsideration The main focus is on defeating others

To those who are primarily influenced by marketing, the most basic strategy

of the organization is serving others Certainly, the organization may face petition Confronting rivals and competitors is a very real activity; doing somust be pursued in conscious and forceful ways Nonetheless, according tomarketing theory, the essence of strategy revolves around service, not compe-tition

com-THE PRIMARY GOALS OF ORGANIZATIONS

According to the warfare/sports analogy, the primary goal is to compete forprofits (that are equated with victory) Profits are viewed as the major purposefor competition, just as winning is the primary purpose of playing a game orfighting a war According to these perspectives, the success of the organization

is measured in terms of successfully confronting others

According to marketing theory, the purpose of an organization is to serve.The better an organization serves its chosen target market, the more effective it

is, and effective organizations tend to enjoy profits Thus, according to ing, profits (the underlying goal driving the organization) are actually a bene-ficial side effect of service By providing legitimate service at a fair price, profitsaccrue; thus, profits are tangible evidence of a job well done This vision oforganizational effectiveness is not primarily based on conflict, but is keyed toproviding service in cooperative and mutually beneficial ways

market-Indeed, in many cases, organizations systematically seek to avoid conflict.Thus, an organization may choose not to compete against a potential rival and,instead, respond to the needs of a target market that is not presently beingadequately served by anyone else In these cases, conflict is overtly avoided andthe organization relies primarily upon providing service in order to achieve itsgoals

By transcending the warfare/sports analogy and by embracing the marketing

Appendix 1 229perspective, competitive intelligence professionals can most effectively embracethe modern philosophy of business that service is the key to success.

THE KEY TACTIC USED TO ACHIEVE THE STRATEGY

According to warfare/sports analogies, the key tactic organizations use is toactively and forcefully compete against rivals By competing, organizations seek

to become more effective and to win business at the expense of rivals According

to this metaphor, the most successful organization wins because it competesmore effectively Although marketers recognize that competition may take place,marketing theory focuses primarily on providing customers and clients withsought-after options All strategists need to acknowledge both the threats andweaknesses of their competitors and the wants and preferences of their custom-ers/clients Nonetheless, those who embrace the warfare/sports analogy concen-trate on competition while those influenced by marketing view service asprimary In many ways the popular warfare/sports analogy, seductive though itmay be, draws attention away from the importance of service and it can emerge

as counterproductive for that reason

Organizations exist, basically, to serve customers and clients As a result,paradigms that focus on service should underlie the most basic strategies andtactics of organizations

MEASURES OF SUCCESS

Those who embrace the warfare/sports metaphor measure success and failure

in terms of how well organizations compete against rivals Assuming that thefact of winning implies that someone else has to lose, victory and defeat areseen to be linked in inevitable ways

According to marketing theory, success is measured in terms of service, notvictory Marketers believe that all stakeholders should benefit from an exchange.According to this perspective, the key relationship is not competition, but in-volves cooperation and mutual benefits that accrue to all involved parties Thus,marketers measure success in terms of service while the warfare/sports analogythinks in terms of successful competition against a rival

These considerations are depicted in Table A1.1

For a number of reasons, warfare and sports analogies are very popular withinthe business world This popularity stems, in part, from the fact that organiza-tions often are in conflict In addition, leaders and decision makers find analogiesthat are based on sports and military leaders to be attractive

Useful though the warfare/sports analogy may be, it draws attention awayfrom the fact that organizational strategy basically seeks to provide services tocustomers and clients Everything else, ultimately, is a tactic It is hoped thatcompetitive intelligence professionals will keep this fact in mind when negoti-ating with clients and pursuing analysis

230 Appendix 1

Table A1.1

Warfare/Sports versus Marketing Paradigms

per-in the case of humanists, many well-traper-ined professionals are unemployed orunderemployed; as a result, recruiting candidates with the appropriate skills andareas of specialization is a realistic goal.

Nonetheless, humanists tend to be very different from job candidates andemployees who are products of practitioner-oriented disciplines (such as busi-ness and the social sciences); although candidates from the humanistic disci-plines may have the skills and knowledge that are required to be of service tothe competitive intelligence profession, they may not possess the temperamentand/or personal style that are required for effective involvement within the pri-vate sector Because humanists tend to be different from typical private sectoremployees, strategies of recruitment and motivation must take their distinctive-ness into account Here are a few thoughts on how to do so

THE HUMANISTIC CHARACTER

It is, of course, impossible to accurately characterize a large number of people

in a uniform way Nonetheless, it is useful to draw a general, albeit an imperfectand incomplete, profile of humanists as a distinct and somewhat homogeneousgroup In general, humanists who have completed a complex course of graduatestudy are mature individuals who have gained extensive training in a specificarea They are also dedicated individuals who consciously chose to pursue ca-reers in areas where they realized that their opportunities were few and not very

232 Appendix 2

lucrative In addition, the humanist disciplines have their own elan and theyoften shun the private sector and the “work-a-day” practitioner world

In order to draw an appropriate profile of humanists, it may be useful to think

in terms of seven different characteristics that may exist (in varying degrees)within specific humanist employees and job candidates A collection of human-ists, of course, is not a covey of clones; each person is distinctive Nonetheless,discussing some common characteristics may provide clues of value when eval-uating humanists They include:

1 Humanists Planned/Trained for a University Career

2 Humanists May Feel that They Are Failures

3 Money/Power May Not Be Yardsticks of Success for Humanists

4 Humanists Tend to Possess Intellectual (Not Practitioner) Pride

5 Humanists Tend to Be “Loners” at Work

6 Humanists May Be Distrustful/Resentful of Practitioners and the Private Sector

7 Humanists May Feel Abused and Misunderstood

Each will be briefly discussed

Humanists Planned/Trained for a University Career

In today’s world, there is but one primary career path for individuals whoseek a humanities Ph.D.: the academic world To be more specific, these indi-viduals tend to seek a position at a “research institution,” although the realities

of the job market often require that even highly motivated and talented uals expand their job search to include “teaching institutions” where researchand publications, while officially praised (and possibly required to gain tenure),are not supported or rewarded in meaningful ways

individ-In general, younger candidates and those who come from the more prestigiousuniversities will tend to be more stubbornly committed to a “research institution”job (or at least a university position) Older candidates and those who weretrained in what are referred to as “second tier” graduate programs will probably

be more receptive to offers from the private sector because they will realize thattheir primary goal of joining a research university probably won’t be achieved.Frustrated faculty at “teaching institutions” who are poorly paid and overworkedmay be particularly open-minded regarding private sector opportunities

Humanists May Feel that They Are Failures

Because humanist job candidates will tend to have been unsuccessful in suing their chosen career path (at a research university), they are likely to feelthat they are unsuccessful Besides feelings of failure, many candidates will taste

pur-a bitter loss pur-as cherished drepur-ams of pur-an pur-acpur-ademic cpur-areer fpur-ade The ppur-ain mpur-ay be

Appendix 2 233all the more acute if these humanists feel they are being cut off from what theyhold dear; after all, a humanities career was probably planned because of strongemotional needs for a particular lifestyle, which drove talented people to spendmany years gaining a Ph.D.

In addition, humanists may fear being shunned by their peers and formercolleagues if they choose to join the private sector (The author, for example,has often been treated like a leper at humanistic professional conferences, when

it was revealed he was working in marketing.)

Money/Power May Not Be Yardsticks of Success for Humanists

The vast number of people want “the better things in life” that money willbuy and the security that a good salary will bring That is as true of humanists

as it is of anyone else Many people in the private sector, however, also look

at money and power as yardsticks of success; such people seek money notmerely for its tangible benefits, but also for the image it creates, and the “brag-ging rights” that go with affluence

For humanists, however, money, conspicuous consumption, and the trappings

of power and prestige associated with wealth are less likely to be major vators that influence behaviors and decisions Perhaps, in time, humanists maycome to conform to the norms of a corporate culture and begin to value moneyfor the status it bestows; initially, however, to use Thoreau’s words, humanistswill probably “listen to the beat of a different drummer.” Furthermore, manyhumanists will probably never embrace money and material goods as statussymbols and they will never primarily judge themselves in terms of corporateaccomplishments or organizational rewards They are more likely to do theirjobs as well as possible, attain a measure of satisfaction from professionallyaccomplishing their tasks, and judge themselves using other criteria

moti-Humanists Tend to Possess Intellectual (Not Practitioner) Pride

While many in the private sector are motivated by money, power, and theimage bestowed by them, humanists tend to be more influenced by prestigewithin a fairly small peer group; this prestige, furthermore, tends to stem fromintellectual prowess, not material affluence or “mainstream success.” Humanistsare just as prideful as anyone else, but their pride tends to stem from verypersonal achievements (intellectual pursuits or clout), not from the status sym-bols provided by the organization

Humanists, as a group, tend to relish intellectual “one-upsmanship” in waysthat are analogous to others buying a new car in order to “keep up with theJoneses.” If this tendency is recognized, organizations that hire and motivatehumanists can create a work environment that appeals to them In so doing, theorganization can provide meaningful challenges that have an ability to motivatehumanists