Episodes

It’s episode 70, the first of season 10, and we’re going back to the Insight Leader’s Playbook. Having looked at the importance of working on Insight’s purpose, profile and people in season 9, we’re now going to explore why we all need a plan for building better partnerships with the internal departments and external companies on whom we rely.

Welcome to episode 71, the second of season 10, and we’re continuing our focus on the 4th P of the Insight Leader’s Playbook – P for partnerships. James is joined by two fabulous guests: • Ruth Hinton, Insight leader at Vue Cinemas and also Chair of AURA, the UK-based volunteer-led organisation, that was originally the Association of Users of Research Agencies • James Endersby, CEO of international Insight agency, Opinium, founder of Significant Insights, and current president of the Market Research Society (MRS)

Welcome to episode 72, the third of season 10, and we’re moving onto the 5th P of the Insight Leader’s Playbook – P for priorities. We all know the 80:20 rule: that 80% of the value of pretty much anything will be generated by only 20% of the things we do. So it stands to reason that selecting the most valuable projects for our Insight teams to work on, allocating the right proportion of resources to them, and working on them in the optimal sequence, is going to be critical to the impact we can make.

Welcome to episode 73, the fourth of season 10, and we’re continuing our focus on the 5th P of The Insight Leader’s Playbook – P for Prioritisation. IMA members and regular Transforming Insight podcast listeners will be familiar with James Wycherley’s obsession with removing the dividing line between Insight teams’ focus on markets, consumers and customers, and the rest of our organisations’ focus on sales, revenue and profit.

In this week’s episode we begin with an analogy I’ve drawn many times drawn between the responsibilities of an Insight leader and the roles performed by the director of a small business. Michael E Gerber, author of the E-myth books, says that it’s a small business owner’s primary responsibility to work on their business rather than in it. And I believe that it’s an Insight leader’s role to work on their Insight team, rather than just in it. It’s to help achieve that goal that I’ve been suggesting that senior people in corporate Insight teams might write their own Insight leader’s playbook. To document and develop your ideas for Insight team transformation, whenever you get the chance, and to build up, over time, a plan for how you can optimise your team’s impact in your organisation.

This week we’re continuing our focus on an Insight team’s products – the output seen by the rest of the organisation. And I’m joined by Clare Gough, an IMA associate who has led great Insight teams at SAB Miller, Daily Mail, Waitrose and Haleon.

It’s the last episode on Season 10, and a chance for James, Emma and Lisa to reflect on the IMA’s latest best practice research, the challenges recently shared by Insight leaders, and our emerging thoughts about the future of Insight roles.