By Anthony Bell

Check out a different spin on connectivity and human relationships. A data infrastructure intern at Facebook put together a color coded Facebook Map of the World tabulating number of friends between each city and their longitude and latitude. Still don’t think the power of influence is important? Check out the MREB’s latest resource, Closing the Researcher Influence Gap, to learn the key steps to train emotional influence.

Throughout the 2010 year, the MREB polled market researcher managers asking the question, “What are the most important skills to your function?” According to the results of the 2010 MREB Research Skills Diagnostic, the top five skills on market research executives’ wish lists this season are:

1. Cross-Project Analysis and Insight Generation
2. Ability to Influence Business Partners’ Decisions
3. Translation Between Business Objectives and Research Results
4. Storytelling
5. Nonlinear Thinking

The results suggest that while the core of Research’s value still rests on a solid foundation of research and insight, those skills are insufficient alone. Generating actionable recommendations based on synthesized insight has become more important (and realistic) as suppliers take on more research execution activities and Research accumulates a wealth of knowledge and data from existing studies. As corporations continue to acknowledge the potential impact of Research insights on the business, the function continues to shift to a trusted advisor stance – as this “wish list” clearly reflects.

MREB members: benchmark your team talent for 2011, incorporating 360° feedback from Research’s key stakeholders – business partners. For more information on in-demand skills and environmental changes, read the Board’s latest coverage of in-demand market research skills.

By Aaron Field

90% of organizations are not currently set up to capitalize on the Social Media world. In the December edition of the Harvard Business Review, our sister program, the Marketing Leadership Council, discusses the New-Media “Ringmaster,” capable of engaging audiences in a seamless, interactive experience. Ringmasters have three capabilities that distinguish them from classic brand managers.

• A strong understanding of social technologies, brand mechanics, and communications.
• An emotional intelligence to build a collaborative network across the company.
• An ability to use social technologies to detect emerging trends or threats and respond quickly.

Most brand managers lack the three critical elements and, handed the daunting task of coordinating a social media strategy, face a long road. In contrast Ringmasters can lead their organization in re-engineering the consumer-to-brand relationship. Read More »

This week’s guest blog entry comes from Sherri Hartlen-Neely, Associate Director of Market Research at Computer Sciences Corporation.

I have a confession to make: I am not a market research analyst. I am an organizational communications professional working in a corporate market research and competitive intelligence team. I’ve always believed in the power of research and analysis but, before joining my current team, the entire research process was shrouded in mystery. I’d ask the research team a question and they would deliver an answer. There was no discussion back and forth; it was simply delivered to me and I moved on with my project du jour.

Then there’s CSC’s ResearchNetwork. This team lives, breathes and eats communication and collaboration. The belief is that research departments need collaboration in order to gather additional insights and perspectives and connect with the internal and external subject matter- experts who are going to bolster their research projects and help the organization exceed goals while providing a continuous stream of value to clients.

For years, CSC has had a variety of intranets, portals and wikis and the ResearchNetwork exploited these resources to “get the word out” about our services and the insight and value we add to internal and external projects and clients. Then comes enterprise social networking with the simple motto of “Connect. Communicate. Collaborate.” And here’s where the story really begins. Read More »

Andrew McAfee, principal research scientist at the MIT Sloan School of Management, recently blogged about why some of the most popular technologies are those that purposely limit individual choice or autonomy.  We all know that consumer will tend to always say that they want more: more bells, more whistles, more independence.  But McAfee points out that too much freedom and choice can be paralyzing, and whether in consumer or business applications, sometimes the best technologies are those that help users find a slot in pre-defined roles.

MREB view: Forced choice models are a staple of consumer research. However research departments spend far less time thinking about choice when it comes to consuming the results of research. Too much choice – the proverbial data dump – actually stops our business partners from seeing the big picture (or even trying to read the volumes of information.) Essentially our business partners are information consumers with the same need for focus as any consumer. Research departments have seen a lot of return on their investments in “guard railed” technology.  Whether dealing with complicated data sets or robust information canons, your entire organization benefits from controlled access: balancing information availability with guidelines and limitations so that information isn’t overwhelming, unusable, or (perhaps worst of all) misused.  Read More »

By Aaron Field

Our parent organization the Corporate Executive Board recently released its findings on Achieving Intelligent Growth, and one of their main findings is that the best companies marry the focus on what they sell with an equally intense focus on how they sell.  Insight has always been a vital if not always visible part of sales success. The best sales reps, however, kick off the sales interaction with insight about their customer. Condé Nast reps do this systematically, in partnership with Research.

Condé Nast publishes some of the world’s premier magazines but faces sharp competition. Just about any magazine, website, or TV station can make a slick presentation to potential advertisers. So instead of “selling,” Condé Nast turns to “teaching.” Their insights team partners with Sales to teach advertisers new and valuable insights about how to market to particular consumer segments. In return, Condé Nast enjoys unparalleled access even when competitors are shut out of conversations.

Regardless of industry, the lesson is the same. The right kind of insight is an advantage to any sales force. The Board’s sister program – the Sales Executive Council – calculated that 53% of customer loyalty comes from the “sales experience” and that the primary experience driver is teaching. That is why the Corporate Executive Board’s Executive Guidance for 2011 tells business leaders to:

“Treat sales channels as the education arm of the corporation” Read More »

A recent study by researchers at Carnegie-Mellon, Union College, and MIT finds that three factors significantly correlate to a group’s collective intelligence (its ability to perform tasks together):

1. average social sensitivity of group members
2. equality in distribution of conversational turn-taking
3. proportion of females in the group (as they tended to score higher on social sensitivity).

Not only is it a bit surprising that social sensitivity would play such a strong role in group performance, but researchers were also interested to learn which factors did not strongly correlate with collective intelligence: intelligence of the smartest in the group, average group intelligence, satisfaction in the group, and group motivation (among others).

MREB view:  As Research functions have evolved from being data providers to delivering strategic value through insights, the decision-making environment within which they operate makes collective intelligence more important.  While tactical research often involved a single decision maker looking for specific facts to inform (or justify) a decision, strategic research generally involves multiple stakeholder making complex choices.  To ensure impact, it’s not enough for researchers to present a great business recommendation with clear logic and implications for action.  We need to learn how to engage business partners on both their emotional and rational concerns. Read More »

As researchers we spend a good deal of time and effort trying to convince business partners to act on our insights.  A psychology study from the University of Queensland may have given us a new tool in our influence arsenal: they found that subjects who drink caffeine before hearing an argument are more influenced by a persuasive message than those who ingested a non-caffeinated placebo.  It seems that the caffeine heightens attention just enough to allow your message to get through.  So, now you know: schedule your meetings right after coffee breaks whenever possible (just don’t overdo the caffeine powder)!

For those of you looking for a less drug-induced way to effectively communicate with line partners, check out our recent work on activating the emotional drivers of decision making.

Innovation consultant Adam Richardson posted the first of a series of blogs regarding customer experience a few days ago.  All companies who have customers have a customer experience, but Richardson believes that until recently it has been a relatively untapped opportunity for differentiation and excellence.  To optimize your customer experience he notes that you must have a deep understanding of:

• Customer Journey-from informing your customers of your service to actually serving them, what does the journey that you take your customers on look like?
• Touchpoints-what are the company-managed channels that your customers interact with—ads, call centers, Web sites, etc.?
• Ecosystems-how can you develop integrated ecosystems to create new customer journeys and experiences?

MREB view: Clearly, Research has a big role to play in understanding and optimizing customer experience, and many organizations don’t even realize the amount of existing data that they have to inform these strategic decisions.  And that’s where customer experience analysis can actually help Research (in addition to Research informing it)—use your understanding of your customer touchpoints to organize and synthesize disparate data streams. Read More »

By Anthony Bell

When you examine your project portfolio, what process do you use to determine which research activities to outsource to suppliers and which have reason to stay inside your team? The traditional supplier approach focuses on the who (selecting good suppliers) and the how (lowering cost or building thought partnership). While selection and cost are important, these considerations presume that outsourcing is always the best option.

The MREB has made the argument that strategically insourcing certain research activities may be the best move for the business. Ideal insourcing opportunities include those that:

• Are cost neutral versus suppliers
• Generate competitive advantage
• Produce equal quality to suppliers
• Add no additional risk

Research deconstructs and root causes the Outsourcing decision, but senior executives may misunderstand the research function as a cost function. Read More »