I've heard it said that the most radical act is to change your mindset. I certainly see the truth of that statement when I work with information teams on Value Chain Analysis.

Information teams want to tie value to business impact. They want to deepen their relationships with stakeholders. They want to be perceived and operate as strategic partners in the business.

But before they can do any of these things, they have to shift their own mindset.

Here's an example of what that looks like:

I recently worked with the information team in a large law firm. The business development team in this firm had aggressive targets for growth. The information team learned this, and proactively reached out to BD with an offer to provide lead lists, market landscapes, competitive analysis and other information products and services that could help achieve the goal.

Whilst the BD team appreciated the outreach, their response was "Thanks, we'll let you know when we need something."

The information team needed to shift its mindset from "Here's what we can provide" to "We understand what you need."

By working with Jinfo on the steps in our Focus on Value Chain, the team:

• Mapped out the specific actions BD was taking to grow revenue
• Aligned each of its services with BD's process
• Calculated the ROI BD could achieve by partnering with the information team – such as estimated growth in pipeline and improved precision in spotting opportunities.

They went back to the business development team with this proposed package of services – and how they tied into BD's process – and instantly moved from the "fetch it" people to a strategic partner in the process.

Of course, the information team was still providing lead lists, marketing intelligence and competitive analysis, but the shift in mindset made all the difference in visibility – and ultimately in realised value.

Changing your mindset takes persistence and practice. At the next Community session, "Value Chain foundation – mastering the mindset", Jinfo clients will have an opportunity to brainstorm and compare notes on changing ingrained thought-patterns consistently over time.

I encourage all clients to register for this important session, and to make sure you get the most out of it by first working through "Step 1 – Foundation" (recorded webinar and activity) in Focus on Value Chain.

On that page, you'll also find the recently updated material for "Step 2 – Validation" and "Step 3 – Application" – a simplified and improved approach to Value Chain Analysis building on what we've learned from working with dozens of information teams since the first iteration of our methodology was published over two years ago.

If you're not yet a client, please contact us today to start the conversation.

Robin Neidorf Director of Research