Commercial intelligence “plan”

Exploration is a managed and controlled process. What is reflected and recorded in the “intelligence plan”? The “intelligence plan” is the basic document that regulates the work of intelligence and the main responsibilities of each individual intelligence officer. This document is classified and is not intended for public disclosure.

You can draw up any document that is convenient for you, or you can use the proposed form, the only thing you need to add is a column for the signature of the employee that he is familiar with the content and deadlines. Everything is based on the results of the strategy session + employees providing the necessary missing information. Remember, it is likely that if the forms will differ, it will not be in their overall content!

General list of research objects (based on the strategy session)
Name of responsible employee	What exactly is being studied (what object and its intelligence attributes)		Timing of reports (date or frequency: e.g. every 2 weeks)	Final term “ of the exploration estimate for the subject matter of the exploration		Revision  Intelligence objectives and targets (outcome of the new strategic session)
Name of responsible employee		What studies and timelines for reports, reports and execution of studies			Processes requiring modernization or benchmarking
Name of responsible employee		What studies and timelines for reports, reports and execution of studies			Outside objects and processes not included in the outcome of the strategy session (e.g.: lawyer and legal changes to business rules)

The commercial intelligence system is based on a five-stage intelligence cycle that is generally accepted (by virtually all intelligence services worldwide). However, in some cases, the division between the elements of the cycle is very tentative.

The reconnaissance cycle includes the following steps/elements:

I.                   PLANNING AND TARGETING - drafting intelligence assignments, preparing an information collection plan, communicating the assignment to executives, and monitoring progress. (Outcomes of the strategy session).

II.                   Gathering - Gathering the information (and passing it on for execution).

III.                   PROCESSING - primary processing of collected information, giving it a certain form, including translation from foreign languages or reformatting of computer data.

IV.                   EVALUATION - systematization, analysis, synthesis, comprehensive evaluation and interpretation of all available data in accordance with the tasks to be accomplished and the development of an INTELLIGENCE ASSESSMENT.

V.                   Dissemination - dissemination of intelligence data (to users) to consumers (if necessary).

As you can see, the content of our table is, in fact, the full content of the intelligence cycle, providing answers to all its contents. There are, of course, other documents that are created and distributed additionally by the intelligence community (we will talk about them in the materials about intelligence documents). You make a plan of action to achieve the goals you have previously outlined. If you have a clear strategic goals and objects, it may be necessary to make an additional plan for these objects. Although in commercial intelligence, tactical business objectives prevail over strategic ones. Remember this!

Once the “ intelligence plan” has been established, it is important that the staff familiarize themselves with it and know their responsibilities for studying specific sites and the deadlines for executing and reporting on operations. This way you can control and manage the reconnaissance process.

When drawing up an “intelligence plan”, base it on your information needs. Remember that there are always a number of information needs beyond what the strategy session identifies. For example, a lawyer and his or her knowledge and contacts. Try to identify such needs up front and include such staff in the intelligence team. Pay particular attention to employees working on topics: benchmarking; process modernization, etc. These do not always lend themselves to initial identification questions. Of course, they can be included in the team at a later stage, but this is always difficult. You should decide in advance whether you need it as a manager or not!

Now that you and your team have a “reconnaissance plan” you will be able to act more confidently and quickly! And remember, reconnaissance is not only identifying reconnaissance targets, but also identifying the reconnaissance attributes of those targets (and the changes occurring to the targets)

Your scouts must be able to find these intelligence attributes inherent in objects (by decomposing the objects themselves) and name them. The work of the reconnaissance team itself will be based primarily on working with intelligence attributes.

The final product of the structure/unit of commercial intelligence - intelligence information of predictive-analytical nature it can bring direct and immediate benefit, however, NOT in “live”, that is called, money, BUT:

This is not about some ephemeral benefits, but a concrete gain in time.

The main component of commercial intelligence activities is not only to identify threats and business opportunities, but to communicate this information to management as soon as possible. At the same time, the company's intelligence structure provides recommendations to top management (admitted persons) on how to react (behavior, acceptance).

These are the main advantages of using intelligence capabilities in business, the cumulative impact of which gives the companies that use them, global competitive advantage, because by identifying threats or new opportunities, preparing options for response (problem solving) and promptly communicating this information to management, intelligence provides its owners with a real and significant gain:

·         in terms of time;

·         speed of response to changes in the external environment;

·         by the potential (unused by competitors) of business opportunities;

·         by the level of financial, material and time costs to achieve the intended strategic goals.

Finally, by obtaining knowledge of the future - preventive information - intelligence can very significantly minimize (avoid or exploit) the risks and threats of impending events or maximize the opportunities.

Naturally, the above does NOT apply to those market participants who neglect the intelligence capabilities of commercial intelligence.

Through forward-looking forecasting, intelligence develops a vision and trends of upcoming market changes, which allows the organization's management to build strategies to achieve its own strategic goals in accordance with these changes and taking into account the peculiarities of market development, technology and other important factors.

·         Ultimately, it allows to get a gain in speed and time of realization of market activity in the strategic zone (activity in the long term) of its activity in comparison with other participants of market relations.

Awareness of the need for management, organization to anticipate changes allows intelligence to offer management options (development) of a new product or business (modernize or tweak the old one) before the old one “plays in the box” (comes into final decline) or loses appeal among consumers.

In seeking new business opportunities, intelligence is able to identify new or related markets, technologies to modernize products, production and business processes, identify and forecast opportunities for new types of goods/services or other products, and the potential for likely consumer demand.

As a result, the company is able to effectively realize its strategic goals in a shorter time (compared to other participants in the market environment), by the most efficient methods, at the lowest cost and with the lowest risks.

·         These are the main advantages of using intelligence capabilities in business, the cumulative impact of which gives the companies that use them a global advantage.

At the same time, commercial intelligence and reconnaissance activities can bring up to 30% - 40% of additional profit to your company. However, this is not direct, but indirect profit, expressed in such criteria as:

·         saving time (e.g., for new developments, management decision-making, adequate response to changes in the external environment);

·         Material, production and other resource savings and cost reductions (due to the availability of information);

·         increased revenues (due to active utilization of the potential of identified business opportunities);

·         prevention, minimization and reduction of costs.

This is the economic and financial contribution of the commercial intelligence unit to the profitability of the company's own business, provided of course that the commercial intelligence activity itself is professionally implemented.