The Internet Age of Competitive Intelligence

by John J. McGonagle, Carolyn M. Vella

Overview

Two of the most prolific and challenging authorities on the topic of competitive intelligence (CI) reflect on and respond to the changes in the field over the last decade. The authors point out that CI users have to change what they are doing, show why they are doing it, and provide ways of doing it. Their book reviews the problems in the development of CI since the 1980s, discusses the impact of the Internet and the rise in use of other secondary sources, and draws from and provides access to the growing body of CI information, knowledge, and literature.

Combining a scholarly approach with hands-on advice, McGonagle and Vella have written the first work to guide CI professionals through the emerging literature of their field. Among the important changes in the field the authors cover are: the radical changes in on line database searching and ways in which the Internet has fundamentally modified how we think of accessing data. Their book explores and reports the major body of work from the Society of Competitive Intelligence Professionals, now that more businesses worldwide are using competitive intelligence and either writing about their experiences with it, or joining in new benchmarking studies. The result is newer information on what really works, what doesn't work, and who is doing what with it. The book is thus a starting point for people new to the field of CI as well as a resource to help experienced professionals do their jobs better.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781567202045
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date:	01/30/1999
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	240
Product dimensions:	6.14(w) x 9.21(h) x 0.56(d)
Lexile:	1270L (what's this?)

About the Author

JOHN J. McGONAGLE is Managing Partner, The Helicon Group, a consulting firm in Blandon, PA. Author or coauthor of 11 business books and numerous articles in business, law, and economics, including Protecting Your Company Against Competitve Intelligence (Greenwood,1998), he has been an adjunct lecturer at Lehigh University and Allentown College, where he developed and taught the course on competitive intelligence. He received the Fellows Award in 1998 from the Society of Competitve Intelligence Professionals.

CAROLYN M. VELLA is Founding Partner of The Helicon Group. She has published widely in the jourbanals serving the business community and on competitive intelligence specifically, and is the author or coauthor of five other books on CI, including A New Archetype for Competitive Intelligence (Quorum,1996). Selected as an Outstanding Woman of America for 1983, she travels widely here and abroad lecturing on CI and other topics.

Table of Contents

Preface
What Has Happened to Competitive Intelligence? A New Era of Business Research—Thirteen Years After
Who Is Using Competitive Intelligence? Where Is Competitve Intelligence Now?
The CI Process—and Its Problems
Needs Determination for CI Research and Analysis
Collection Issues: Research Strategies and Techniques
The Rise in the Importance of Secondary Sources
Using Online Databases
How to Use the Internet
Effective CI Techniques to Supplement Secondary Research
Analysis
Presentation and Dissemination
Legal and Ethical Issues
Securing and Protecting Competitively Sensitive Information
Management Issues
Operational Issues
Appendix
Glossary
Selected Bibliography
Index

Editorial Reviews

This guide for competitive intelligence (CI) professionals emphasizes new developments in the field, such as the changes in online database searching and the ways in which the Internet has modified thinking on accessing data. Other topics include collection issues, the rise of the importance of secondary sources, analysis, presentation and dissemination, and legal and ethical issues. The book is a starting point for people new to CI as well as a resource for experienced professionals. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.

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