Bain & Co - using Jinfo's resources worldwide
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By Catherine Dhanjal

Abstract

Monica Ertel is director of Global Information Services at Bain & Company, one of the world's "Big Three" largest strategy consulting firms. We asked Monica how she and her team of 90 information staff worldwide use Jinfo's articles, reports, Community sessions and other services.

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We interviewed Monica Ertel, director, Global Information Services at Bain & Company, to find out how the information team uses Jinfo's resources across the organisation's worldwide information services network.

Jinfo: Could you tell us a little about the structure of your information centre?

Monica Ertel: Bain & Company is a global management consulting firm, one of the world's "Big Three" largest strategy consulting firms.

As such it's imperative that our information services team provides excellent service to the company.

I have five direct reports who are based in Singapore, Munich, Paris, Boston and San Francisco. The team gets together in person twice a year and we have regular video calls every six weeks. We find video the best medium as it's good to see each other while we're talking and we find that video calls ensure everyone's really engaged, they can't be distracted by emails and so on.

We operate as a global team with many projects taking place cross-regionally and involving around 40% of our entire team of 90. People enjoy working in this way and we benefit from different perspectives on the projects. We use this model to develop small projects and more ambitious ones.

Jinfo: How do you use Jinfo's Insights & Actions reports produced at the end of each Research Focus?

Monica Ertel: I find these really helpful. They are always very relevant to what we're working on and they form an important part of our yearly evaluation of the Jinfo Subscription.

Each of the five senior managers took a section of a recent Insights & Actions report and talked about some of the key points. For example, whether we're doing the right things, whether we're aware of things to watch out for.

Jinfo: How do you use Jinfo's content in team meetings?

Monica Ertel: At our information team senior management meetings we choose articles or reports that are relevant to our department. Sometimes this may be an article from Jinfo for us all to read and we then discuss it and share our thoughts on the key points.

When we were working on our strategic plan we selected the report "The information team with 'the right stuff'" to discuss while preparing our strategy. There were many key points which resonated, such as "is your team ready".

Each region also has its own staff meeting on a regular basis and it's someone's job to choose an article from Jinfo and lead a 10-minute discussion. People are encouraged to think around the article and to discuss new ideas. The articles are also a useful starting point to educate people as to what's out there, for ideas validation and to get different people involved in the discussion.

Jinfo: How do you use Jinfo's other articles and reports?

Monica Ertel: Jinfo reports are so targeted to the information industry that we'll often find ourselves nodding our heads up and down as we read them, Jinfo really "gets us".

The market landscapes are useful too. We have someone on the senior management team responsible for global sourcing and she reads the market landscapes religiously and finds them very helpful.

When articles are particularly relevant, like the ones around big data, we circulate them to our entire information team of 90 people. The senior management team will discuss the article in our regular meeting and then produce a summary based on the article and discussion which we circulate to the entire team along with the original Jinfo article.

This also lets the wider team know what the senior managers are looking at and gives us the opportunity to create some sparks with them and to look at things in a new light.

The State of the Industry Community sessions are always useful. When possible, we attend these every year and share key points with our team.

The "related items" links at the bottom of reports and articles which highlight other Jinfo items of interest are often very useful and regularly relevant to everything we do.

Jinfo: How else do you get value from Jinfo?

Monica Ertel: In my role I focus on the bigger picture strategy and value of the service the information team provides. I really appreciate the yearly call with Jinfo's director of research, Robin Neidorf. We talk through Jinfo's research agenda and Bain's and other key topics and usually find the two are very aligned.

About Monica Ertel

Monica Ertel is currently director of Global Information Services for Bain & Company where she leads their worldwide information services network of 26 information centers around the world. Her responsibilities include managing a group of nearly 100 researchers who provide high-level research analysis and support, desktop delivery of key information resources, end-user consultant training and strategic information leadership for the firm.

Monica holds a Master of Library Science degree from San Jose State University in addition to an MBA from Santa Clara University.

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