Issue 16 - Five Minute Insight - Customer Insight Solutions



	Issue 16 - July 2008 CONTENTS Introduction Insight in Practice - It's Time To Communicate - about making time for thinking and communicating - Do You Customers Need an MOT - on Moments of Truth - Meet the Team Member - Party Animal Pete Developing Skills - Have We Got News For You.... - on journalistic skills and the editor role - Making A Habit Of... Starting From The End - the 2nd of 7 habits - Tip of the Month - Dressing Up: The 10% Rule Training and Feedback - Autumn Courses - Book Now! INTRODUCTION Welcome to the 16th edition of 5-Minute Insights, the e-mail newsletter from Steve Wills and Sally Webb at Customer Insight Solutions (CI Solutions). We hope that in the few short minutes that it takes to scan the key messages, you will find snippets that are both informative and stimulating. If you want to find out more, we have provided links to longer articles for some of the insights. INSIGHT IN PRACTICE IT'S TIME TO COMMUNICATE Insight teams can easily spend a disproportionate amount of time in managing a research project or analysing data, whilst allocating only a relatively short time for communicating the resulting messages. Helen James of Insight Partners says: *“An average insight communicated well has more value and impact than a brilliant insight communicated badly.”* Unfortunately, it’s all too easy to leave the presentation of the results to the last minute, which can mean that they don’t have the impact they deserve. Here are a few principles that might help you to use your time more effectively: You need to be very strict with your timekeeping. If necessary, devise some false deadlines to make sure that you have enough time to do justice to all of your hard work. Make time to think, to work out your main messages, and to decide the most effective ways of explaining them so that they have the desired impact. To find out more, please click here. Or to find out more about our course on Impact Writing please click here. DO YOUR CUSTOMERS NEED AN MOT? Any Insight team can benefit from an MOT analysis of their products and services, and use this as a benchmark for all their research and analysis. The MOT (Moments of Truth) concept says that customers have countless ‘touch points’ with your company, products or services. Any one of these has the potential for good or bad, and can either make or break the relationship. The key to any positive or negative experience is an unexpected outcome. For instance, you can encourage customer loyalty by responding in an unexpectedly helpful way to a crisis. There are three key steps in an MOT analysis: Identify all your customer touch points - These aren’t just standard ones where a relationship is uneventful and smooth, but also those exceptions where needs change or problems occur. Analyse the frequency and repercussions of these events - How many people experience them, how many have unexpected outcomes, and how much impact do these have upon the customer’s view of your company? Work out what needs to change - How can you eliminate the negative experiences, or encourage the positive ones? To learn more about Moments of Truth and the differences they can make to your company, please click here MEET THE TEAM MEMBER As mentioned in the last issue of 5MI, this edition sees the start of a new series that looks at different Insight team members. Our characters are designed to portray different styles of behaviour, based on the book, ‘People Styles at Work’. Party Animal Pete The style This month, we are looking at Party Animal Pete, who is an Expresser. Expressers are faster paced but people-focused. They tend to be visionary and creative, and animated when they speak. They must be careful not to overpower others. The substance Pete is the life and soul of the party. He’s full of ideas and enthusiasm. He motivates some people but others can find him over the top. So how can he adapt so that he energises more of his colleagues without losing his natural creativity and enthusiasm? The solution Pete needs to be aware of his potential to overpower and out-talk everybody, so that he can modify his behaviour accordingly. He needs to remember the old saying that you have ‘two ears but only one mouth’ – and you should therefore spend twice as much time listening as talking! To understand more about how Pete can change his ways, please click here DEVELOPING SKILLS HAVE WE GOT NEWS FOR YOU.... Have you noticed the similarities between insight and journalism? Both involve gathering and interpreting information and then presenting it in a way that makes people want to read it or listen to it. In journalism, however there is a greater emphasis on presentation. So, how can we learn from this? The key journalistic role is that of the editor, who needs to look at the different stories coming through and decide which have the priority. Beyond this, there are sub-editors with expertise in different areas. Visualising how an editor in a major newspaper works (with regular meetings to review stories and their priority) can help Insight teams to see how to share what they’re learning, and view it as a part of the whole picture. One requirement of an editor’s role is longevity. If a specific sub-editor keeps changing, it’s hard for them to build a really deep understanding of their area. Some insight personnel like working on a range of topics. But there is also great satisfaction in becoming an expert in a particular area. Whatever the size of your team, try allocating editor roles for key business areas and see how much it increases your understanding of these areas – and the value you deliver to the business. Please click here for more details about how insight teams can learn from journalists. MAKING A HABIT OF... STARTING FROM THE END This is the second in our new series of seven articles based around Steven R Covey’s excellent book, “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. This habit is all about having the end in your mind whenever you’re embarking on a new process or a project. Covey states that this requires a clear vision of both your current position and your destination. You can then clarify what needs to be done so that you can reach that destination. There are at least three ways in which the habit of ‘beginning with the end in mind’ can be applied in the insight world: A sense of mission - Insight teams need to step back and look at their overall mission to make sure that they are concentrating on the most valuable issues or tasks. Plan before you present - Whenever you have a report or presentation to make, spend time planning it first. It will then be much more coherent. It’s all in your mind’s eye! - Visualise your success before it happens – for example, visualise a successful presentation – and then deliver it. For a more detailed look at this habit, please click here. TIP OF THE MONTH Dressing up: The 10% Rule We all know that insight is as much about delivery as content. If nothing changes, then it isn’t insight – so our ability to influence things is paramount. Getting people to take notice is about credibility, and that credibility is as much about how we look and sound as what we are communicating. So, how we dress matters! But with dress codes varying so much from one place to another, how do we get it right? To over-dress is often as bad as to under-dress, as it suggests a lack of recognition of the social norms for that situation. We suggest following this simple rule: ‘Always dress so that you look 10% smarter than the people you are working with.’ It means that you will impress others and that you will potentially stand out without being over the top or ‘disconnected’. TRAINING As part of our regular 6-monthly programme, these are the dates for next set of courses in the autumn. Book now to be sure of a place. Or contact us if you want to run one as an in-house course. Insight management: from vision to reality: 23rd October 2008 Sharing the vision of good insight management, with key processes and skills to help you on this journey. "Loads of useful learnings! I've applied one already today" Delegate Open Course 2007 Commercial thinking: 9th October 2008 Enabling you to present your proposals and recommendations in £s not %s, to raise your profile and impact with marketing colleagues, finance and the Board. "Probably the most useful course I've ever been on" In-house course - Professional services How to communicate for maximum impact: 18th September 2008 Hands-on training to increase the impact of all your written insight communications, from emails and presentations, to reports and newsletters. "Energising course with great practical applications" In-house course - Financial services Click here for more details, and to book FEEDBACK We want 5-Minute Insights to be as useful as possible. That's where you come in! Please email us at feedback@cisolutions.co.uk with any comments you have about its content, its style, or with requests for items that you would like to see. If you have a difficult problem that you are having trouble solving - such as a Marketing Director who insists on ignoring unwelcome insights; or an issue that is challenging your team on the journey towards insight - please let us know. If we can make helpful suggestions we will, and if several people have a similar problem, we will write an article for 5-Minute Insights. If you would like to pass this newsletter on to your colleagues, please feel free to do so. Equally, if you know anyone who would like to be added to the mailing list, please let us know. If you would like to unsubscribe, please click here.