As if the people responsible for innovation in a business don't have enough to worry about. The academics have come up with another concept for them to grasp.
Technology Intelligence is all about developing systems "to capture information about emerging technologies and trends and to deliver it in a usable form to decision makers". It is something else to keep innovators on their toes.
This new management toy comes from the Institute for Manufacturing (IfM) at University of Cambridge. A team there went and looked at the approaches companies used "to gather information, exploring their strengths and weaknesses and identifying practical ways to address common problems".
The IfM has come up with a short note on its findings. This describes the ways in which companies seek out Technology Intelligence:
- Trawling: making in-house information explicit, particularly information that is not known to be there.
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Mining: extracting explicit intelligence information from internal resources such as libraries and databases.
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Targeting: focusing on new technologies outside the company and monitoring their development.
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Scanning: keeping abreast of any unforeseen developments beyond the firm that could have an impact on the business.
An important point they make is that "Simply collecting information is not enough. Companies must ensure it reaches the right people."
As the world's secret services will tell you, it also helps if your spies compare notes. As the note puts it:
"Often technology, market and competitor information is collected separately. It is important to encourage communication between the three areas as both market and competitor intelligence can contribute valuable information about new technologies."
As you'd expect, the IfM is keen to market its expertise in Technology Intelligence. They will even sell you a workbook "that summarises the research into company intelligence systems and gives practical tools and advice". First, though, start with the academic papers that have come out of the research.
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