I have a colleague at a Fortune 500 company who was once very frustrated with his organization's low level of marketing sophistication. If you've felt similarly, take heed...Understanding your organization's execution maturity and how to improve it will help.
Execution maturity has emerged in consultant-speak (ah, leave it to consultants to come up with new buzz words) as a framework for assessing your organization's proficiency...in this case, its ability to transform market intelligence into profitable innovation. Your company executes the process at a level of proficiency you can assess.
Execution maturity covers three dimensions: supply, demand and application.
Supply
This refers to the capacity of our organizations to develop useful market intelligence. At the low end, market data is generated by an unskilled staff who collect secondary research or manage very basic surveys. Anecdotal reports from sales people and others around the organization might contribute more data. There's no repeatable "intelligence process" in place.
At the top of the scale are organization's proficient in marketing research, business intelligence and competitive intelligence. This is not to say that these same organizations demand this intelligence or apply it well.
Demand
This refers to what stakeholders ask for. In mature organizations, decision makers are knowledgeable about different kinds of market intelligence and how to use it.
In organizations where there's little maturity in demand, research departments are often peppered with lots of irrelevant requests. (I used to get these on sticky notes at one firm that will remain nameless.) Often, these have little to do any decisions to be made (otherwise known as "CYA" research).
Application
This refers to transforming market intelligence into profitable innovation. It's not unusual for companies to be proficient at executing marketing research but inept at applying what's learned. Here are a few more things to consider:
- Dissemination. Is market intelligence freely accessible to those who could use it or does it only reside in the heads of requesters?
- Combining. Are multiple data sets being combined to create powerful, proprietary views of innovation opportunities?
- Decision rights. Do users have the authority to act on the intelligence? If not, then there will be little application value.
Implications for Marketers and Researchers
You might not be able to avoid frustration, but managing it is key. To begin improving your situation,
- Estimate your organization's maturity on each dimension
- Selectively validate your assessments with trusted colleagues
- If enough people with juice in the organization agree with your assessment, then you'll begin to gain traction
- Get ready to act. If demand is a problem, be prepared to educate. If application is the problem, get more consultative in up-front intelligence planning. If supply is the problem, look for external vendors who can complement your existing capabilities.
--Jason Sherman, Whyze Group
To receive email updates on future articles designed to empower marketers and researchers, please send an email here with the word "subscribe" in the subject line.
If you have a questions, comments or an article you'd like to submit to The Market Intelligent Executive, please email here.
Comments