How Valuable is Market Intelligence and Industry Knowledge?

I like my job.

This is my first blog post and will give you a very quick sense of who I am; but it will also explain why I find my area of expertise continually frustrating!

So, returning to my first statement: I like my job.  Not only do I find my colleagues engaging and professional, I also think that Corporate Learning is an area which is perpetually refreshing.  Training professionals are continually learning; knowledge champions are continually sharing their expertise.  For me, though, it goes deeper than this...

Falling through a gap - somewhere between what most marketeers and demographers call Gen X and Gen Y - perpetually, I am trying to learn more about technology!  Learning Intelligence is the juxtaposition between these two forces: how to apply technological advantage to make sense of training and knowledge effectiveness.

Very early in my career (with what used to be one of the 'Big 5' accountancy firms), my then-manager instilled in me the desire to become a "trusted business advisor"; long before this term was bandied about and applied to pretty much any support personnel, this was someone who informed and made recommendations, based upon sound judgement and industry knowledge.  I have always found the concept to be valuable, but at the same time, seeming just out of reach - I think this means that there is no right or wrong way to be a trusted business advisor, as long as you are credible and provide value, it is possible to develop, continually.  As I gain seniority, this is how I try to mentor my teams and mentees.

To quote Bob Dylan, though, "the times, they are a-changin'"!

Having built my reputation on providing insight to which others may not be party, or from which others may not have the time or resources to obtain, in recent times I have sought to utilise social media, for these purposes (check out http://twitter.com/#!/MTLawrence).  There is so much information available that, by using sources such as Twitter in the right way, you can get at much more information, much more quickly than ever imagined before.  Furthermore, it is possible to connect with other related professionals (like-minded, or otherwise), very easily - boosting the objectivity of my own opinions.  All good, right?

Well, so I thought.  Recently, however, I have found that my [previously] strong performance ratings have started to take a dent and the only feedback on offer was along the lines of "we're not interested in what others do, we just need you to push us forward".  Yes, there may be some impact on my time (- ironically, I note that I am drafting this blog during work hours - for shame!), but on the whole, 90% of my social media activity takes place on my own time.  I am concerned that my stakeholders may be missing the bigger picture:

That with continual cuts in budgets and resources, perhaps it is they who are impacting the time I have available to 'push us forward'; and that, without my knowledge of other relevant developments, case studies, or experiences, judgements may be ill-founded.

So, how valuable is market intelligence and industry knowledge?  With a nod to the seniority and deeper experience of many of my stakeholders, I would suggest that perhaps they re-consider.  

Recently, I attended the Chief Learning Officer Magazine Symposium (#CLOSym) and was fortunate to catch a keynote from Mark Miller, VP of Training & Development @ChickfilA, who was explaining their take on leadership, summarised by "Five Practices of Great Leaders":

1. Great Leaders see the future
2. Great Leaders engage and develop others
3. Great Leaders reinvent continuously (self, systems/processes, structure)
4. Great Leaders value results and relationships
5. Great Leaders embody the values (walk the talk!)

Part-way through this amusing and engaging presentation, Miller recounted witnessing the great Peter Drucker being asked "what is the most difficult decision a leader makes?" Drucker, apparently bowed his head for several minutes (causing the audience to wonder if the management guru had gone to the Great Business School in the Sky) before raising his head again and answering "Who does what?"

The point is that Drucker knew the in's and out's of leadership, and others such as Miller were there because they wanted to learn from Drucker.  Ask Jack Phillips about the Kirkpatrick model and he would have known it inside-out.  Ask Professor Gary Hamel about Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs or Tuckman's Situational Leadership model, for example, and he'd look at you as if you were on a planet he left many moons ago!  Even for acknowledged thought leaders [- yuck! Yes, I hate that phrase too, but you know what I mean!], it is crucial to live, eat and breath everything about your subject.  

To learn, continually.  After all, isn't that the business we're in...?