Episodes

Welcome to Season 7 of the Transforming Insight podcast!Episode 48 is going to begin where we left off with our focus on the positioning of Insight teams – the relentless focus that successful teams have on their position in the hearts, minds and decision-making processes of their organisations.

Over the last few weeks, we’ve explored the first three pathways that successful Insight teams have taken to improve their position in the hearts, minds and decision-making processes of their companies. We’ve called these brand, awareness and reputation, and each involves looking at our Insight team and the messages that it communicates to the rest of the organisation, either intentionally or unintentionally. Do these messages align to consistently improve its position?

Episode 50 of the IMA's Transforming Insight podcast is now available. In this extended episode, James talks to Carolina Otero, Head of the Insight Function at Nestle UK.Carolina is one of our few podcast guests whose journey into Insight was not an accident, but a conscious choice. Bringing us on a journey through her career, from Argentina to the UK, Carolina has seen both agency and client-side roles working with a list of enviable brands and companies.Understanding the value in her learnings from previous roles, Carolina shares her experience of a total reset and redefinition of Insight at Nestle UK. Carolina was a driving for transformation, building a new foundation for the Insight team.Carolina shares her playbook on empowering teams, highlighting the importance of helping each team member contribute to and feel part of the collective growth, ultimately achieving a team that is greater than the sum of its parts. We examine the shift from technical expertise to skill…

What does it mean to be commercial?Is it about having passed your accountancy exams? Or perhaps having the ability to sell used cars? Or being experienced in leading Sales teams? Perhaps it’s about having the unshakeable inner confidence that if you were in the boardroom on The Apprentice TV show, you would be hired, not fired?

In our last episode, we started to talk about money.Insight commerciality is the IMA’s 8th best practice territory and the one where our capability benchmarking shows there is the most development to do for many Insight teams.No organisation can expect sustainable financial success unless it develops and leverages an expert understanding of its own operational performance, its customers’ behaviour, and the financial outcome of customers’ interaction with the organisation.This is very unlikely to happen in a large company if the Insight function doesn’t recognise that its work is integral to commercial success. And that applies in the public and not-for-profit sectors as well.

Episode 53 of the IMA's Transforming Insight podcast is now available. In this extended episode, James chats with Caroline van den Bos, Insight and Client Experience Director at Lloyd’s Register.Caroline shares her unique path from studying history to becoming a prominent leader in corporate insight. She reflects on how her background in history equipped her with essential research and strategic thinking skills. Caroline also discusses her transition from marketing to insight, her impactful tenure at MBNA, and as Chief of Staff at Bank of America. She highlights the crucial role of Lloyd's Register in the maritime industry and her current efforts to enhance commercial and strategic decision-making while driving client-centric transformation.

It’s episode 54, the last of season 7, and our Summer roundtable. As usual, James is joined by Lisa Dutton, the IMA’s Head of Team Development, and Emma Jones, Head of Insight and Content, to review the latest best practice research and hot topics of conversation.In this episode we talk about the importance of managing the relationships we have with an Insight team’s external partners and suppliers in a more strategic way; about the need to review our own team’s ‘product range’; and the critical role of project prioritisation.