Webinar: The Modern CI Practitioner, Three Conversations on Where the Field Is Headed
For most of my career in competitive intelligence, the hardest part of the work was getting the information. Finding it, verifying it, and putting it in front of a decision maker before it went stale. That problem has not gone away, but it has changed shape. AI can now surface in seconds what used to take an analyst days. Which raises a new question for everyone in this field: if gathering is getting easier, what is the CI practitioner actually for?
My answer is that the role does not shrink. It moves. The value is shifting away from collecting information and toward the things a model still cannot do well: reaching the sources that are not online, reading the politics of an organization, knowing which insight matters this quarter, and getting people to act on it. That is where modern CI earns its keep, and it is a conversation I want to have out in the open.
So we are launching a new webinar series: The Modern CI Practitioner. Three live sessions, built around candid conversation with people who actually run CI functions. Not theory, and not a product pitch. These are the real questions practitioners are wrestling with right now, including the messy ones we usually only discuss off the record.
What the three sessions cover
September 29: CI's Role in the Organization. Where CI sits, and how it earns a voice. We will look at how functions are positioned, resourced, and mandated, and what the rise of AI is changing about all three.
October 6: Going Beyond AI. What AI can't reach, and how practitioners close the gap. AI has real limits for this work. This session is about the primary intelligence that fills them: voice-of-customer interviews, expert networks, and direct human insight.
October 13: Spreading the Word. Getting CI heard, and proving it pays. Good intelligence is worthless if no one acts on it. We will talk about how effective functions share insight, navigate competing agendas, and demonstrate return.
Each session runs about an hour, and every one picks up where the last left off, so the three build into a single arc.
Who you will hear from
I am glad to be joined by two people who know this work from the inside. Scott Frost, Director of Competitive Intelligence at Splunk, has built and led CI in exactly the kind of fast-moving environment these sessions are about. Jennifer Pipia, an intelligence and insights leader, brings a practitioner's view of what it takes to turn intelligence into decisions.
I will be hosting alongside two Fletcher colleagues: Patrick Sturgeon, our VP of Sales, and Mark Gigliotti, our VP of Tech Consulting. Between us we spend our days on both sides of this problem, the producing and the consuming, and we intend to keep the discussion honest.
Why this, and why now
CI has spent years fighting to be taken seriously. AI could make that harder, by convincing leaders that anyone with a chatbot can do the analyst's job. Or it could make it easier, by clearing away the low-value gathering work and freeing practitioners to do the parts that genuinely move a business. Which way it goes depends a great deal on how clearly our field can articulate its own worth. That is what this series is for.
If you run a CI function, sit on an insights or strategy team, or rely on this work to make decisions, I would like you in the room.
Save your seat
The series runs September 29, October 6, and October 13, at 11am ET. Each session is 60 minutes, with time for your questions at the end.
I hope to see you there.
