Transforming Insight Podcast James Wycherley

Today’s podcast is the first in Season 6, and our first on the critical topic of Insight team positioning.

It’s a concept the IMA introduced 9 years ago, and ever since we’ve been slightly obsessed by Insight teams’ need to optimise their position in the hearts, minds and decision-making processes of their organisations.

There’s an analogy we often use when we talk about positioning, describing Insight as a lighthouse…

There is no point in producing any research or analysis unless it drives change.

So, forward-looking Insight teams think carefully about how they are going to disseminate their insights and ideas. As we’ve heard in earlier seasons of our podcast, the IMA’s most effective corporate members have developed:

• Influencing skills and plans to help them to persuade specific decision-makers to follow their recommendations, and
• Communication skills and plans to enable them to share customer and market knowledge throughout the organisation

To borrow a marketing analogy, this is rather like a company focusing on selling to key clients, and also developing advertising to communicate the benefits of its products across a broad market. Both are established tactics, but they are both much easier if the company has first developed a well-respected brand.

Episode 44 of the IMA's Transforming Insight podcast is now available. In this extended episode, James talks to Renate Brockes, Customer Insight Lead at Transport for London.

Renate brings us on her journey from her initial role in market research at the Met Police to leading TFL's Insight team. Renate reflects on her experience of guiding a team through multiple organizational restructures and the complexities of public service. Sharing her aspirations for the team, the importance of collaboration and stable and clear direction is discussed.
Taking a look at the challenges the pandemic brought to public transport Insights, Renate shares her pride in her team for their ability to flex when Insight became the most valuable commodity to the business at that time.

Renate also shares her experience and advice for being a leader in an Insight team.

Please listen to find out more!

I hope you all enjoyed episode 44 and my interview with Renate Brockes from Transport for London?

I took a lot from it, including some of Renate’s insights about imposter syndrome which we’ve found a great input to the research that my colleague Emma’s doing ready for our March Insight forums (in Manchester, online and in London on the 6th, 13h and 20th March respectively – please go to this link for more details - https://www.insight-management.org/5-min-insight/next-insight-forums)

But today we’re going back to where we left off in episode 43, when I suggested that Insight leaders should think about their departments like companies in a market, and recognise the important role that brand can play in framing perceptions.

I suggested that should go beyond visual cues like logos or straplines, and include reflection on team purpose, the promise we are making to other departments, and the positive and negative impacts that our personal brands can have on other people’s perceptions.

But how many researchers and analysts have watched from the touchline while marketing teams debated the finer nuances of what their brands stood for, and watched them get terribly excited about details which meant far more to them than to consumers?

Episode 46 of the IMA's Transforming Insight podcast is now available. In this extended episode, James talks to Hazel Nicolson, Associate Director of Insights at Coca-Cola EP.

Hazel brings us back to her decision to take up her role at Coca Cola EP and why she wanted a “pure Insight role”, rather than to continue working on the application of Insights.

Reflecting on the challenges facing the Insight team when she first joined, Hazel reveals how the team was liberated to perform more in-depth analysis tasks, by empowering colleagues in other areas of the business with the tools to self-service their data needs.

Hazel shares the Insight team’s three-pronged approach to driving a more Insight-led business, and the challenges and successes she has encountered.

Describing her split approach to management and leadership, Hazel highlights the importance of workload management and clear priority setting. Hazel also shares her advice for others in Insight leadership roles.

It’s episode 47, the last of season 6, and our Easter roundtable. And James is joined by Lisa Dutton, the IMA’s Head of Team Development, and Emma Jones, Head of Insight and Content.

In this episode we talk about the positive vibe around AI in Insight at the moment, accepting that it’s still very early days. IMA members are exploring ways to save time using AI to draft questionnaires, summarise large documents, and suggest headlines for slides. Some are even cheating on Lisa’s storytelling workshops – which we love, please use it to cheat with pride!