January 2010 - SCIP CI magazine

From Firefighters to Futurists:
A Practical Roadmap for CI Development

Many organizations find it troublesome to implement and develop their intelligence programs. Some of them manage to create a program and run it, but then have difficulty developing it further. Other organizations set the intelligence fundamental pieces (information collection, analysis, information network etc.) in place and operate a large operation, but nevertheless have difficulties developing a world-class intelligence operation where intelligence output is included in the key organizational processes (such as strategy, marketing, sales, and product development) and has a clear impact on the decision making and strategies of the organization.

This article presents a framework for implementing and developing a competitive intelligence (CI) function from its first step to becoming a world class intelligence capability. This framework can also be used by CI professionals on all levels to better understand their existing operations and what is needed to develop it further. A case study shows how this approach has been used by Ciba for developing their competitive intelligence program.

INTELLIGENCE DEVELOPMENT ROADMAP

The GIA Intelligence Framework incorporates the development of intelligence into an evolutionary process that can be implemented in every organization. When a company first starts an intelligence program, their management cannot expect to have a world class operation immediately. Rather the program’s development follows a certain path where at each step or level it encounters some identifiable obstacles which have several solutions. We have identified five levels of growth from the start level to world class level, and six key success factors that moves the program throughout those growth levels.

Five evolution levels

In the five levels of the intelligence evolution roadmap, the CI manager has a different role in each one. (The five levels are described in Table 1) Each level contains obstacles that must be overcome before the CI function can move on to the next level.

TABLE 1: FIVE EVOLUTION LEVELS

Intelligence Levels/
CI Manager Role		 Description
1. Informal CI
The Firefighter		Mainly conducts intelligence activities on an
ad-hoc basis with little coordination.
Few resources, no identified scope and process.
2. Basic CI
The Beginner		Incorporates the first steps toward developing a
structured intelligence program. Based on an
information needs analysis, studies some basic
aspects of its organization’s business environment,
 but still on an ad-hoc approach. Low degree of
future orientation and CI culture development.
3. Intermediate CI
The Coordinator		Proceses in place including secondary source
collection and advanced analysis but still operates
within a rather narrow scope. Commonly implements
a CI portal. Still little integration into the organization’s
business processes.
4. Advanced CI
The Manager		Internal CI processes in place, such as an
intelligence network and inclusion in organizational
decision-making processes. The CI process output
is more coordinated and creates a more holistic
picture of the organization’s business environment.
5.  World class CI –
The Futurist!		Integrated into key organizational processes and
based on sophisticated intelligence products with
a high degree of future orientation.


Six Key Success Factors

The same truth applies to all six key success factors (KSF): the further the program advances through the various levels, the more sophisticated process it needs. For instance, at level 2 the intelligence program’s scope can be quite narrow, often only focusing on specific issues in the organization’s business environment, whereas on level 5 all aspects of the environment are considered.

Table 2 contains an overview of the key success factors any organization needs to master in order to have a strong intelligence process in place

KSF Plus Development Levels

Combining the six key success factors with the five development levels creates a 30-box matrix. Each box describes a KSF relevant to each of the development steps. In order to grow the CI function, organizations need to implement the appropriate steps that match the description for each box (not shown here, please download PDF.)

By reviewing the development roadmap, you can identify the present status of your own organization and what is necessary to move it up a level.  The roadmap can also help identify the CI function’s future objectives.  For example, where do want to be in 2 years? The Roadmap will then give you clear insights with regards to how to reach that next level.

After completing a status review, CI functions often find themselves working at different levels for each key success factor. They might, for instance, have a very well developed CI tool but not so developed scope or processes. However, all KSFs need to be at the same level before the CI function can successfully transition to a higher level. No quick solutions possible here, unfortunately.

Over time, most CI functions should reach the intermediate level, where the basic intelligence processes are in place. At that level several specific issues arise and they all must be addressed before the organization can move on toward the advanced and world class levels.

ADVANCED AND WORLD CLASS CAPABILITIES

In order to develop advance or world class capabilities, the following aspects needs attention and development.

Co-creation of intelligence: It is not enough to strongly employ external information sources. In addition, the critical signals from the field that needs to be picked up by sales people, general managers and others who spend much time outside the organization must be integrated into the CI information mix. Input from top management, developed through scenario analysis workshops, war games, and other interactive sessions, are also required to improve the content of the intelligence analysis. We term this co-creation of intelligence. It is both a way for obtaining a more varied input of information as well as it is a great tool for affecting the company intelligence culture since it involves participants from the whole organization.

Intelligence scope / intelligence portfolio: The intelligence operation’s focus must be broadened to encompass all aspects of the organization’s external environment such as politics, macro economic issues, technology, societal trends, etc. Furthermore the depth of intelligence analysis must be greatly increased, as well as developing a future orientation as an analytical output. Examples of such deliverables might be War Game reports, scenario analysis, early warning reports, etc.

Intelligence perspectives: The results of intelligence operations carried out by different units often result in parallel tracks that develop multiple intelligence perspectives for the same issue. These outputs should be integrated into a cohesive perspective before being delivered to the intelligence client. In addition, parallel intelligence efforts often reinforce the silo-mentality of intelligence.

Organizational culture support: An organizational culture that supports team effort and knowledge sharing, and that has organizational stability, curiosity and strategic flexibility can better support intelligence activities than a culture which is the opposite. Companies that master this have intelligence education sessions for new employees, conduct internal marketing campaigns regarding intelligence, and master the art of intelligence co-creation.

Key business processes: Integrate intelligence into key business processes such as strategy, innovation, product development, sales, marketing, etc. Without this integration, it is difficult if not impossible for a CI function to reach the higher levels. 


These issues normally take time to develop or transform. Many are clearly outside the ability of intelligence directors to directly change. However, CI professionals can influence them indirectly through the efforts of other managers.

These managers are willing to become involved since the intelligence output clearly supports the business processes or projects they are responsible for.

TABLE 2: KEY SUCCESS FACTORS FOR INTELLIGENCE

 Key Success FactorDescription
 CI ProcessAny organization has a CI process, whether it is
informal of formalized. Initially, the process can
be quite simple and will develop over time.
In the end, it needs to tie in to various business
processes such as strategy, marketing, sales,
business development, etc. to have a
major impact.
 CI OrganizationHave an organization that can handle planning
and direction of intelligence operations,
information collection, analysis and communication
of intelligence. Initially it often starts with the lone
CI manager, but in the end can become a quite
complex set-up of steering groups, internal and
external networks for collection, analysis teams,
IT support.
 CI ScopeThe scope of the CI operations refers to a) the
areas of the business environment that the
intelligence process covers (technology, competition,
macro issues, customers, suppliers, etc); b) the depth
 of analysis and c) the degree of future orientation.
Normally, the scope is quite narrow, but then needs to
be widened since the intelligence topics normally
become more complex to analyze and to
understand.
 CI CultureThe development of an organizational culture that
supports open communication, team- spirit, information
sharing and focus on shared goals. This is one of the
hardest issues to affect for a CI manager.
 CI ToolsAvailability of appropriate tools for management,
information collection, analysis, and knowledge
sharing. For example, intelligence portals can be
tools to tailor-make intelligence for individuals,
and to share and integrate external reports with
internal signals.
 CI DeliverablesInitially, the CI deliverables are often ad-hoc reports
that answers a certain question. Regular briefs,
newsletters and a shared CI portal are deliverables
that many companies develop over time. In order to
reach the advanced level, an intelligence product
portfolio containing branded intelligence products for
different purposes and different target groups
should exists.


A thorough description of each level is not possible within the framework of this article, but future articles will provide more detailed insight to each level.

FROM EVOLUTION TO REVOLUTION

So far we have described an evolutionary framework. What about a revolutionary one? Is it possible to for the intelligence effort to jump several levels? We have seen situations where CI functions have managed to move from level 1 to level 3 quite quickly.

Some companies have started their CI efforts by outsourcing much of the collection, structuring and analysis of information. This approach can successfully reduce the internal time and resources required to identify information sources, collect external information, structure that same information and develop a system to store and share relevant pieces of intelligence. The CI staff then focused their internal resources on managing internal knowledge and properly integrating the intelligence output into key business processes. Identifying a short-cut from an intermediate position to world class is more difficult, if not impossible since it involves the participation of many persons and relates to all key success factors.


Please download PDF for all 3 tables.


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