CI 304 – Reporting & Communication of Intelligence

WHEN: November 10, 2023 Virtual
FACULTY: HALLENBECK
CREDITS: 0.7 CEU CREDIT
SUMMARY: This course will cover both reporting techniques and communication styles to build credibility inside the organization, with the aim of establishing CI in the enterprise as a decision-support and high-value function.

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This course provides instruction on the effective communication of intelligence findings. Students will have the opportunity to learn writing and presentation techniques that contribute to the actionability, decision-relevance, and impact of intelligence in a corporate setting.

The best intelligence collection and analysis will have no impact if it is delivered poorly. In this class, students will learn techniques for the effective communication of intelligence findings to executives and decision-makers. Combining techniques including expository writing, argument mapping, persuasion, and presentation skills, students will have the opportunity to improve their communication skills and learn the unique aspects of intelligence communication.

You will learn:

  • Thinking for writing, to structure and outline your intelligence deliverables in advance
  • How to map arguments, address contradictions, and bolster the credibility and effectiveness of intelligence judgments
  • Persuasive writing and presentation techniques to prepare and deliver compelling intelligence presentations
  • How to anticipate, spot, and deal with stakeholder questions, disbelief, mindset, and hostility

Here we list the key questions that this seminar addresses. If you can answer “yes” to three or more of the 10 questions posed for this course, it will meet your needs.

Do you need to …

  1. Know how to produce truly “actionable” intelligence?
  2. Know how to deliver a compelling intelligence briefing?
  3. Know if your competitive intelligence team has credibility in your company?
  4. Have a formal organization to produce and communicate effective intelligence?
  5. Evaluate the intelligence organization’s communication output?
  6. Assess if your intelligence function can network and advocate within the company
  7. Have adequate resources, i.e., people and money, to effectively communicate intelligence?
  8. Have a method for identifying management’s intelligence needs?
  9. Have your management understand and use your intelligence capabilities?
  10. Know if your current intelligence organization meet your company’s needs?

All ACI programs teach students how to overcome the most challenging competitive intelligence issues. The following are sample lessons taught in this module:

1. Producing Actionable Intelligence

The Business Intelligence (BI) department has been operating for about a year. It has a good reputation for being very responsive to management’s requests, answering the hard questions. It produces a bi-weekly Intelligence Newsletter and competitor assessments that are very comprehensive. The Department has been asked to make intelligence inputs to the company’s Long-Range Plan and several business unit strategies. Yet, it does not seem to be getting the recognition it believes it deserves. What more can be done?

Questions

  1. Is the Director of Intelligence invited to the President’s weekly staff meetings?
  2. Are the Department’s intelligence products resulting in business actions?
  3. Are there other types of intelligence products and services that the Department should be offering?
  4. Does the Department assess the “value” of its intelligence products?

2. Communications and Reporting Techniques That Drive Effective Decision-Making

Your General Manager have identified several intelligence topics for you to explore and report on at an upcoming quarterly business review. He asks that you be persuasive in your arguments using actionable insights to influence and drive decision-making.

Questions

  1. Who is the primary audience? What is required to deliver to one or more strategic or tactical stakeholders?
  2. What key intelligence questions is the business struggling with now or will they have to deal with in the future? Is the key question tightly focused, actionable and answerable in more than one way?
  3. What is the bottom line message you want to convey? What is your elevator speech you would express if you had one minute? Does your title and answer provide unique, significant insights and go beyond what may have been shared previously on the subject?
  4. How do you deliver a compelling storyline that ensures your insights drive action?

3. Managing Your Organization’s BI Operations- Are You the Right Person for the Job?

You have just joined the company’s main-line business unit (BU) after three years in the field support group. The head of the BU has asked you to take the lead in establishing a CI function. You know the BU has not been doing well lately, mainly due to the aggressiveness and success of several new competitors.

Questions

  1. Are you the right leader to engage and empower the company to utilize competitive intelligence?
  2. How do your peers and previous managers characterize your “thinking”?
  3. Do you personally network and get to know diverse teams across the company?
  4. Can you communicate strategic shifts that may not align with the current business plans?
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