Competitive Intelligence Marketplace

CI = Corporate Spying? Not.

Thanks to the HP case competitive intelligence is once again being equated to corporate spying.  Check out this ABC News piece online for a prime example.  An excerpt:

Corporate spying to protect information crucial to a product's development or marketing is not new in America. It's sometimes called "competitive intelligence" and is practiced by no fewer than 5,000 corporate spies, according to Business Week magazine.

Many large companies spend more than $1 million a year tracking their competitors, building the program right into their sales strategies, according to the magazine. The result? Companies avoid unnecessary costs by knowing their competitors' strategies and marketing plans.

This kind of stuff drives ethical CI practitioners nuts, and for good reason.  They are essentially being equated with sleazy private investigators and that just isn't fair.  For a refresher on the ethical commitments of good CI practitioners check out the Society of Competitive Intelligence Professionals' code of ethics:

• To continually strive to increase the recognition and respect of the profession.
• To comply with all applicable laws, domestic and international.
• To accurately disclose all relevant information, including one's identity and organization, prior to all interviews.
• To avoid conflicts of interest in fulfilling one's duties.
• To provide honest and realistic recommendations and conclusions in the execution of one's duties.
• To promote this code of ethics within one's company, with third-party contractors and within the entire profession.
• To faithfully adhere to and abide by one's company policies, objectives, and guidelines.

Competitive Intelligence Geeks in Iraq

According to this short article the intelligence gathered at division or brigade level in Iraq has been more effective than that provided by the intelligence "establishment":

In Iraq, a hodge podge of geeks and reservists (many of them cops or corporate "competitive intelligence" specialists) came up with lots of new ideas about how to collect, analyze and distribute intelligence. This was usually done at the divisional or brigade level, although some battalions, and even infantry companies, have come up with their own innovations. It was innovations like this that led to the capture of Saddam Hussein, and many prominent terrorists.

Professor Behaving Badly

This tidbit is from an article in Wired magazine about the rise in fraudulent research:

In March, Dr. Gary Kammer, a Wake Forest University rheumatology professor and leading lupus expert, was found to have made up two families and their medical conditions in grant applications to the National Institutes of Health. He has resigned from the university and has been suspended from receiving federal grants for three years.