Practical action on Jinfo's Research Focus, from a commercial intelligence perspective
Jinfo Blog

By Anja Chemnitz Thygesen

Abstract

We interview an information specialist in the commercial intelligence field to find out what they found most valuable about the Research Focus, "Source Expertise - What It Means in a Google World", and how it's affected their thinking and future plans.

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We interviewed a team leader in information management for a company working in commercial intelligence for the energy, metals and mining industries. They shared their takeaways from the Research Focus, "Source Expertise - What It Means in a Google World".

Jinfo: What did you find most valuable about the Research Focus?

Information manager: I think that Jinfo is very good at articulating things that we need to consider. Although I haven't seen everything that has been published during this Research Focus, it's on my to-do list to dig more into the contents and read the articles. I'll also listen to the recording of the webinar "Balancing 'Generalist' and 'Specialist' Expertise".

From what I have seen in this Research Focus, the source expertise theme is a very good way to express and surface some of the things we are struggling with and to increase our value in the organisation. The material is quite hands on and helps us using and communicating our expertise to the rest of the organisation. The Research Focus has also been a good reminder for us that we actually have some expertise that we should promote more.

One of the things I found most useful was the webinar "Source Expertise and Your Value to the Business" which was about sources, technology and value. This gave me some inspiration on how to measure things and I'm sure we will be using these tools in future.

I also know that someone in my team who handles queries found the Community session on mature query handling very useful. She said that it was interesting to learn how the processes can be improved. I'm sure we will be looking more into that as well.

Jinfo: How has this Research Focus affected your thinking/work?

Information manager: For us it's very much about visibility and being more valued in the work that we do. This Research Focus gives us a methodology to work with our expertise and that is valuable to us.

We are working on balancing generalist and specialist skills, like many information managers, but I'm not sure if it's practical for us to go deeper into the specialisation. We already have some regional specialists but only one industry specialist. If I could replicate her competencies, that would be ideal.

Jinfo: What actions will you take?

Information manager: I'm not sure if we want to go deeper into the specialisation of skills. I will go through the thoughts with my two managers and then we will decide what to do based on what we've read and seen.

On a day-to-day basis I often post things and articles on our chat room for others in the team to read and share. This is how we stay updated and circulate ideas throughout our team.

The main lessons learned from this three-month Research Focus, plus a thematic index to all content published, are included in the report Insights and Actions from the Research Focus "Source Expertise - What It Means in a Google World", visit the Research Focus page to get your copy.

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