From shaming to faming: A perspective challenge
Piotr JJ Szymanski
Insights professional. I help organisations make better decisions faster and drive change by applying agile mindset to data.
There is no shame in using market research to support smaller, less ‘strategic’ business decisions.
Doing so doesn’t make one look incompetent. It doesn’t imply one is oblivious to their business, or clueless about their customers. It doesn’t stick an ‘inferiority’ banner across one’s corporate chest.
Quite the opposite!
Employing market research to support one’s everyday work means they understand that better-informed business decisions are… well, better. It demonstrates they know how to make best use of available decision-making support tools. It helps one validate their working hypotheses; enabless them to make stronger internal business cases; and increases their personal success ratio in short-, mid-, and long-term.
Often times, organisations engage in initiatives and set objectives that defy one’s attempts to measure success using traditional business KPIs – at least, directly. Yet, measuring success remains the cornerstone of best business practice. Smart use of market research to generate meaningful data and actionable insights offers a proven solution here. It makes one leading the pack, not lagging it.
Operating in increasingly fast-paced environments and forced to cut down on development cycles, many organisations adopt test-and-learn philosophy and introduce a variety of ‘agile’ ways of working. Keeping sharp focus on goals at all times, and maximising chances of success are key. Fast turnaround market research feeds mission-critical information to these iterative workstreams, contributing data and insights as and when required. It offers true competitive advantage to those willing to embrace the habit.