Some years ago I interviewed Sue Whelan Tracey, former commercial director for one of the UK's big four banks, and at that time a director at Moneyfacts, an NHS health trust, and a major diabetes charity. Sue told me how much she tried to champion the use of customer insight in every organisation she worked with, but she thought that we didn't always make it easy for ourselves.
Her observation was that senior people in business always speak the language of finance, and that shapes their perception of business issues.
But when they ask the Insight team for help addressing those issues, we respond in a different language - sometimes the language of the customer, sometimes the language of research methodology or analysis.
Sue's frustration was that Insight teams know so much that could help their organisations, but by failing to translate our knowledge, findings, recommendations and opinions into the right language, we are failing to optimise our impact.
And worse, our organisation misses out and doesn't leverage its investment in Insight.
Customer and market knowledge, said Sue, is far too important - and expensive - for us to leave it to senior decision-makers to translate our findings into their language 'through the filter of their own ignorance'.
So this episode of our podcast is all about the importance of placing a financial value on the projects we work on, the observations we make, and the recommendations we put forward.
It's often easier than we might think, and the potential benefit is enormous.
Please listen to find out more!
Topics Discussed
- Speaking the wrong language (2.45)
- Estimating the size of the prize (8.11)
- Using the IMA’s prioritisation matrix (12.02)
- Adopting valuation as a habit (16.02)
This is episode 55 of the Transforming Insight podcast.
If you have the ambition to transform your Insight team and the role it plays in your organisation, please tune in to future episodes. Not only will we explore the 42 secrets of successful corporate Insight teams as outlined in the Transforming Insight book, we will also talk to senior corporate Insight leaders, delve into books that have inspired us, and discuss new best practice research carried out with the IMA’s corporate members.
You won’t want to miss this! So please subscribe - and thank you for listening.
About James Wycherley, the author of Transforming Insight
James Wycherley was Director of Customer Insight and Analytics at Barclays from 2005 to 2015 when he became Chief Executive of the Insight Management Academy (IMA). A popular keynote speaker and acknowledged expert on Insight leadership, strategy, and communication, he is the author of the book Transforming Insight: the 42 secrets of successful corporate Insight teams, and over 35 IMA publications. He has provided thought leadership in the UK, Western Europe, the USA, Canada, Australia, India, and the Middle East, and regularly hosts the IMA’s Insight forums - London, Manchester, UK Online and US Online.
The Insight Management Academy is the world’s leading authority on transforming Insight teams.
Resources:
If you would like more information on any of the ideas discussed in this episode of the Transforming Insight podcast, please visit www.insight-management.org
Copies of James Wycherley’s book Transforming Insight: the 42 secrets of successful corporate Insight teams can be purchased direct from www.transforming-insight.com
Disclaimer
The Transforming Insight podcast is published by the Insight Management Academy and produced by Zorbiant.
All rights reserved.
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