I've always been fascinated by analyzing the key information that leads to decision-making. You know, when we find a nugget of information that allows us to define a strategy out of the ordinary.
As Véronique Mesguich so aptly put it in her latest book information has become like the air we breathe: we no longer bother to go looking for it, so much does it radiate around us at every moment.
In business intelligence, I've noticed that the crucial step of analyzing information is often neglected. With the widespread use of intelligence platforms, many people unfortunately tend to want to reduce the practice of intelligence to the simple use of automated collection solutions. Platforms are truly indispensable because of the time savings they provide, notably by centralizing keywords, sources and information, but they do have their limits.
Here's a screenshot of what I see on our platform as part of my internal watch on strategic decision-making tools and techniques. 69 sources, 2724 articles in 18 days, that's what's generated.
So it's analysis, as a watchdog, that enables us to combat infobesity, to gain objectivity and neutrality. I believe that it is precisely this ease of analysis that enables us to gain in creativity, and that is so essential for bringing weak signals to light. You know, those trends that are still imperceptible when you read a single document. To learn more about weak signals, I invite you to reread the following post.
Beyond the techniques for obtaining key information, there's everything that falls under the watchdog's transversal skills. Here are just a few:
In closing, as you may have guessed, not everyone has these qualities. When the time comes to decide whether you'd rather have your own in-house monitoring system or call on external consultants like Phar to do your monitoring, ask yourself.