Intervista a Deonie Botha, autrice del libro "Creating a Competitive Intelligence Capability - Developing the Intelligent Organisation"

La possibile crisi economica e la globalizzazione dei mercati potrebbero produrre forti limitazioni alla competitività delle imprese italiane, specialmente quelle piccole e medie. Negli ultimi anni abbiamo assistito all'intensificarsi della competizione, ed ormai siamo abituati a ragionare con una logica internazionale, cioè consideriamo l'Italia come un mercato locale, all'interno del mercato europeo. Questa internazionalizzazione diventa sempre più una sfida per le imprese, ma può essere una sfida - realisticamente sostenibile - dalle sole aziende che sono dotate di un marketing idoneo, e di quelle che possono avvalersi anche della funzione di competitive intelligence.

Marketing-Intelligence ha il piacere di pubblicare una breve intervista a Deonie Botha, autrice del libro "Creating a Competitive Intelligence Capability - Developing the Intelligent Organisation".

Marketing-Intelligence > could you present your upcoming book, "Creating a Competitive Intelligence Capability" ?
Deonie Botha: "I have been lecturing Competitive intelligence at the University of Pretoria , Pretoria , South Africa for the past three years. I realized that a need exists for a book that presents Competitive intelligence in a practical manner accompanied by the necessary theoretical backdrop. There is a vast variety of Competitive intelligence courses available however not all of them have the necessary theoretical backdrop and make provision for assessing the knowledge level of learners on completion of the course. This book will focus on these two areas".

Marketing-Intelligence > when did you decide to write a book on competitive intelligence ?
Deonie Botha: “I simply became tired of the multitude of articles I always had to obtain copyright for in order to be able to distribute it to my students. I decided to take the best from what is published on the topic, my own practical experience of Competitive intelligence and my experience in academia and to just sit down and write the book”.

Marketing-Intelligence > what could be considered a best practice in CI ? how identify a "success case" in a company with a particular commitment to competitive intelligence ?
Deonie Botha: “World-class Competitive intelligence practices is characterized by three success factors, namely: understanding and participation by senior management, a culture of information and knowledge sharing and lastly a passion and persistence to deliver timely, actionable and relevant products”

Marketing-Intelligence > is it possible to measure competitive intelligence payback ?
Deonie Botha: “Yes, I think measuring the value or payback of Competitive intelligence is over-emphasized – my view is always “Keep it simple” – a lot of articles have been written about this topic and people should just do a bit of research!”

Marketing-Intelligence > is it hard to plan and implement, in a company, a competitive intelligence service ?
Deonie Botha: “It depends on a lot of variables – the country in which you are, the nature and maturity of the industry, the organization etc etc and again so much have been written, there are a multitude of conferences, experts, professional bodies to learn from…why reinvent the wheel?”

Marketing-Intelligence > are you interested in organizing an event in Italy ?
Deonie Botha: “I would be more than willing to join forces with Italian experts in organizing an event!”

Marketing-Intelligence > some news about INTELLIGENCE 2.0 ? Do you have an opinion on 'web 2.0' and a possible new CI paradigm ?
Deonie Botha: “Technology is only an enabler of Competitive intelligence….true intelligence rely on the skills of humans”.


Deonie Botha is a lecturer at the Department of Information Science, University of Pretoria. She lectures and writes extensively on a variety of topics which are of relevance to strategic intelligence namely, knowledge management, competitive intelligence and business intelligence. She serves on the executive committee of the South African Committee of Competitive Intelligence Professionals (SAACIP).

Book

Paperback: 200 pages
Publisher: Chandos Publishing (Oxford) Ltd (1 Feb 2008)
Language: English

Audience: Professional