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When It Comes to Business, Something Hasn’t Changed, or Has it?

August 20, 2010 By 7 Comments

I recently dug out the following article I wrote about a year ago, comparing the differences of conducting research between business and recruiting. I have no doubt in my mind that, information is power and how you use it can and will decide the success of your business. I’ve said it before “Information is not free at all“, especially the valuable insights that has helped in decision making. Why? Because it’s a systematic process that (a) it takes smart people to create content and share it (b) it takes people time to access the right information (c) it takes intelligence to analyze, to “make sense” of it.

With the hype of social media and internet evolution making information access easier than ever before, I don’t see much has changed in terms of performing business research and obtaining business information.

Do you have different experience? If you are a business owner, how do you go about finding the information you need to make your next decision a smart one, one with no regrets? I’d like to hear your thoughts.

The original article is posted on The Source Newsletter here

….. Being an Information Professional for over 17 years, I have been taught and trained to always looking for authoritative, creditable sources when it comes to business and competitive intelligence.

I started my career with McKinsey & Company where valuable information is critical to client’s success; I spoke to associations sharing industry insights, I searched high & low on commercial databases (Lexis, Factiva, EBSCO to name a few) for valid facts, and I networked with internal consultants to seek their expertise. After that I went to work for a major bank here in Canada, again supporting research for Investment Banking and Enterprise-wide initiatives.

Reputable resources are never fully accessible on the net for free, ….. Since I am a trained Information Professional who works best with visualization, I have drafted a simple diagram here to exhibit in business and recruiting worlds, the ultimate information we are looking for are as follows:

In business, investigation is a ‘must’ process during CI information gathering, “Good Researchers are investigators” someone once told me. After we researchers exercised our curiosity practice and did it in a MutuallyExclusiveCollectiveExhaustive way, it’s really up to the management/business owner to decide whether, and how, to use the information, because behind every good business decision is an information professional.

So, Research is Research, No Matter What. I’ve said it and I am glad I did. This is just my two cents of being a newbie Recruiting Researcher and an experienced Business Researcher.

Share your opinion here and I thank you for doing so.

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  • http://www.naturallybeautifulphotography.com JenGPhotog

    I look for information relevant to my business – photography trends, marketing techniques for photographers, pricing etc. I look at other photographer's websites and then come up with my own ideas with what I think will work for me in my geographical location. I also take into account the demographics in the GTA. If I price myself too high for the area, I won't get any business. Too low and I'll get clients that don't appreciate my work.

    Frankly it does give me a bit of a headache! :)

  • sarachi

    Thanks for sharing your experience, Jen. Do you find it's time consuming to find all the information? Would you benefit from working with someone who understands your business and concerns, to looking into that for you and free you up to mind other important issues; or you'd rather do it yourself and work longer everyday?

  • http://www.naturallybeautifulphotography.com JenGPhotog

    I don't because I know where to look. Perhaps when I was first starting my business, it would've been helpful to have someone guide me through the photography sites that were useful/useless.

    I can definitely see how a service like what you're suggesting would be beneficial though!

  • sarachi

    Thank you, this is great exercise.

  • Anonymous

    Thank you for stopping by Evelyn :)

    Interesting point you raised about primary info (or proprietary) which most companies guard carefully; when it comes to secondary info, sadly to say but the common perception is, it is available on the net and social media so it is free, where the time invested to access and extract is often overlooked. I tend to ask clients how they put value on the information that helps seal a deal, save cost, gain market strength? Without careful planning and know where to go, it will be “garbage in, garbage out”.

    Can not wait to continue this conversation over coffee very soon, so excited ! :)

  • Anonymous

    Thank you for stopping by Evelyn :)

    Interesting point you raised about primary info (or proprietary) which most companies guard carefully; when it comes to secondary info, sadly to say but the common perception is, it is available on the net and social media so it is free, where the time invested to access and extract is often overlooked. I tend to ask clients how they put value on the information that helps seal a deal, save cost, gain market strength? Without careful planning and know where to go, it will be “garbage in, garbage out”.

    Can not wait to continue this conversation over coffee very soon, so excited ! :)

  • http://twitter.com/evelynso Evelyn So

    Working in the digital/marketing/tech/innovation industry, the key is about setting the scope of information search. By nature, this industry moves at warp speed and many of us are very early adopters of social media that feeds our tendency to share information.

    With clients, it is most sensible to dig for primary info (what they already have) then decide the need for secondary info (using various methods). Blindly venture into the wild west is totally counter-productive. It is also extremely important, as you pointed out, to understand the Why, What, When, How, Who e.g. how to analyse the data should be planned BEFORE collecting such data, or else all you have would be “garbage in, garbage out”.

    I have various ways to scope, conduct, analyse and apply data, depending on the work in question. Coincidentally, I am providing strategic consulting services to the recruiting department of a global bluechip firm. While the subject matter may be different from, say, when I worked with telcos, the core process and thinking is the same.

    I can go on but let's do this face-to-face :)