Tools For Thought - Intelegia

The blog post, “Competitive Intelligence Research With LinkedIn - Who’s Hiring?” discussed the use of LinkedIn to anticipate a strategic move at a competitor through a potential hiring (i.e., job opportunity).  This type of competitive intelligence  research can be an element to a larger initiative to profile a company.

Through the Advanced People Search function on LinkedIn, researchers may gain further valuable strategic insights about a company.  Figure 1 illustrates the advanced search interface.

Figure 1: Advanced People Search Interface on LinkedIn

One of the pieces of strategic intelligence that can be collected from this type of search is profiling a department / function at a company.

Case Scenario: As a competitor to Hewlett Packard in Canada, you are asked to have an understanding about the company’s strategy planning function.

Solution: Using the advanced search interface, enter the following information to build the query based on the case scenario:

• In the “Location” field,  select “Canada” and delete the content, if any,  in the “Postal Code” field
• In the “Position” field, enter “strategy” and select the “Current or past” option
• In the “Company” field, enter “Hewlett Packard”

Figure 2 presents the query when the details are entered.

Figure 2: Building An Advanced People Search Query For Individuals In The Hewlett Packard Strategy Planning Function
Please Click On The Image To Enlarge

Figure 3 is the screen shot of the results based on the submitted query.

Figure 3: Results For The Query For Individuals at Hewlett Packard’s Strategy Planning Function
Please Click On The Image To Enlarge

Selecting the individual with the position of “Senior Business Strategy Manager” leads you to access to the following job description available in Figure 4.

Figure 4: Job Description For The Position Of “Sr. Business Strategy Manager” at Hewlett Packard

From the image above, you can see that the strategic planning function at Hewlett Packard is composed of:

1. Forecasting
2. Budgeting
3. Resource Planning
4. Strategic Direction
5. Financial Controls

Furthermore, you are able to find out that there is an existing competitive intelligence unit at the computer hardware giant in Canada.