Making the tough sale...in CI and life

My wife says honey attracts more flies than vinegar. This elaborates on that: Predicting who will make the pitch, raise donations, preach the most influential sermon, make the sale. Some of this can be learned. Some probably not. http://tinyurl.com/ycstfh4

Carrier pigeons and CI management

From the Rothschild stories:Carefully train & develop your courier pigeons (for e.g. field sales) to gain first mover advantage; use misinformation wisely to throw competition off track(e.g. manipulate CEO travel schedule during M&A) and play your cards closer to the chest (e.g. keep it in a small circle of associates in a world of no secrets). Hedge your bets by benefiting from multiple outcomes (sequence, segment, know your markets). Lend to governments...they can usually raise taxes to pay you back! http://tinyurl.com/y8l8y49

Are you ready to decipher voiced info

As more and more communications transition to voice from text with improvements in voice recognition software and improved connectivity with other devices, it will likely become necessary for CI professionals to improve skills in "capturing" data in this new voice environment: Everyone on Bluetooth equivalent, talking up a storm complete with use of code words for security enhancement. Could be another opportunity, as when cold war melted in the 80's, for intel/national security types to migrate into private sector in a new wave.

http://tinyurl.com/ylou8oz

Passion over perfection

Passion/persistence >> perfection even in BI & CI. Fishermen know this too. See metaphor of ratty flies: http://tinyurl.com/yju3eqh

Robustness in putting the pieces together

You may not be a nerd, but you are a node and node creator/operator if you are a good CI, BI professional. NYTimes profiles US intel failures re X-mas day attempt by Nigerian to blow up airliner flying to the US. Sounds strangely familiar with what I have experienced in the corporate intel world. Especially in big complex companies.
See: http://tinyurl.com/yf6r2sv

First and foremost as a CI, BI you must create and operate the vision of all critical information flowing through a CI, BI node. That is probably you. It's endlessly time consuming to keep this vision fresh as people come and go but what are the options. You don't want 20/20 vision to be only in hindsight.

Those field sales people, those logistics experts, those visionary marketers and product developers, those number crunchers, those deal doers, etc. They all have a contribution to make to your understanding of the market, the competition, the invention space. Lead them.

Recent research on BI and social media, 2010 trends for BI professionals

From MarketingCharts.com new info on how bus intel professionals see recent trends in their space including importance of SM. 63% undecided about value of SM sites. Many feel pressure for showing more rapid results to justify their pay checks. As needed data bus model expected to continue to grow. 49% say BI is becoming more appreciated.
Original research done globally (n>125) by Kognito and Baseline Consulting. http://tinyurl.com/ygmnpal

Be interesting to cross-tab output with degree of expertise by BI professionals in SM and related and emerging tools like Twendly for locating SMEs. http://tinyurl.com/yjfc7t3

Diversity and CI

As diversity extends beyond demographics, one can envision a day where everyone is a minority and the cycle starts all over. As the www/SM fosters more and more affinity groups and micro-segmentation, probably need to get SCIP to lobby defining CI as a minority deserving recognition within corporate/societal diversity programs :-)

http://tinyurl.com/yff7l92