Events
| Forthcoming Events |
We encourage like minded passionate practitioners, be they from the supply or demand side to step forward and take the floor to share with other like minded professionals in pursuit of the UK CIF’s aims and objectives - to continue to make the market in the UK by providing inspiring content through its networking events and website to discover, to enhance, exchange and problem solve for SCIP members and non members alike.
Content has been streamed into 5 topic areas to reflect the most relevant needs of the CI discipline and its stakeholders within companies wanting to benefit from its value. We aim to appeal to all interested parties irrespective of their level of experience.
1. Innovate Integration of CI within the Business
Authorative sources - like the book titles reviewed by the UK Competitive Intelligence Forum - claim the value of CI is best realised with its tight integration into the companies' existing decision making processes, be they at a tactical or strategic level. This stream focuses on case studies that allow the audience to understand the situation, the steps taken and the results of integrating CI around decision making to add value to the business, irrespective of its focus.
2. Effectively Managing Information Overload
Social media is on the rise. The large and growing number of users it attracts claims to offer a rich pool of insights from key opinion leaders about your company, your competitors and your industry. Google's Eric Schmidt stated as much information is created in 2 days today as was done from the dawn of man through to 2003. There are a growing number of social media monitoring tools, information aggregators, published sources, web 1.0 and companies' employees with experential based opinions and perspectives that can present the practitioner with having to drink from a fire hose on more occasions than not. How does IT provide a platform that allows practitioners not only manage information overload but get to the valuable analysis stage to ensure that the processing time through to the recommendation stage of intelligence can take place and be reduced?
3. Analysis In Action
Case study-based overviews of the use of a or a number of analytical techniques to take the issue in hand from so what to what’s next. Attendees welcome being kept honest with an appreciation of things that worked well and not so well as well as the impact. There is also an argument that instead of a tool, all is needed is a white board, a marker and a few good brains. You decide which approach is best.
4. Communicating with Impact
Communication skills are consistently ranked as being one of the most important skill sets for a Market/Competitive Intelligence Analyst or Manager. Often we think that just undertaking the analysis and hoping that that the stakeholder can see what we think is blindingly obvious is enough. Job done. Increasingly we have to tell stories and ensure that our audience starts in the right place, understands the challenge of the Key Intelligence Topic behind the business question being posed as well as the analysis that sets up the recommendations for what's next.
5. CI Professional Growth
This streams looks to explore how practitioners can improve on their existing positions - analysis only gets you so far - and enhance their impact within their companies as well as lay out paths for the next stage of practitioners' careers. The UK Competitive Intelligence Forum has regularly taken the pulse of the CI discipline to understand where we are and what's next irrespective of our length of involvement with the discipline. Topics have also extended to measuring the value, stages of programme developments as well as leveraging consultant skills to obtain the right buy in, structure the right brief and then deliver consistently on the business issue at hand.
The profession does not and should not stand still. New ideas and different perspectives are always welcome. For additional details to be considered for future speaking opportunities, please contact us or email us at info@ukcif.co.uk.
