As a business support system and decision engine, the insights industry is under increasing pressure to keep pace. Business leaders across every sector are being asked to make decisions quicker than ever before, leaving less and less room for months of rumination over every strategic call.

One could easily oversimplify the challenge to, “You want your insights fast, good or cheap?” The reality is more nuanced, with competitive pressures and changing customer expectations that will not wait for all details to be vetted as in the past.

Is there a proper and beneficial middle ground? Can speed and quality coexist? The honest answer is, “you don’t have a choice.” We have seen our share of industry evolutions. Some fade but we suspect this one will stick. The trick is making sure to get the best out of your insight investment by working smarter, not just faster. The following is our perspective on how we are making it happen for the clients we serve so that you might find the right solutions to suit your needs and demands.

The Race to More Agile Decision Making

There was a time when marketing applied what skilled craftsman refer to as “measure twice, cut once” for strategic and tactical planning. Taking a patient and thoughtful approach to assess, strategize and execute was a standard practice. Formulating big campaigns, mapping out every detail before launch, that was what you did.

Technology has obviously upended the apple cart and accelerated the pace of play. “Test & learn” is a facet of digital-first brands. Companies are looking to adapt tech’s “scrum” sensibility to solve problems faster. We have all become comfortable with our technology constantly being updated with new versions. It is relatively easier for digital versus physical brands, but as customer expectations evolve they need to find ways to keep up, stay fleet of foot and make smart decisions faster.

How is that defined in the context of the types of decision a company needs to make? In a recent study, McKinsey outlined the nature and exposure of C-suite, Senior and Mid-Level leaders to different layers of decision making:

Big Bets – occur infrequently but come with high stakes as they are likely to reshape a company’s future
Cross-Cutting – broad scope but more frequent and familiar, a series of smaller, interconnected decisions as part of a collaborative process, such as pricing, new product development or channel management
Delegated – very frequent and narrow in scope, typically run by a team or individual operating with limited input from others and fully accountable for the completion and outcome

*Source: “Decision Making in the Age of Urgency,” McKinsey 2019*

Of the 1,200 business leaders surveyed, most reported being exposed to “cross cutting” followed by “delegated” decisions. While more often a fact of life for Mid-Level managers, C-Suite and Senior leaders spend a great deal of time making many decisions at these levels, and like anyone need to do so effectively and efficiently.

A major insight from the study was how much time decision making consumes. In total, the majority of respondents reportedly spend 30% of their working time making decisions, and about one-quarter are making decisions most of their day, with ratios varying by seniority. No matter the level, the study found that 61% of all leaders felt their decision-making time was not well spent. This level of ineffectiveness comes with a cost. As McKinsey put it, “For managers at an average Fortune 500 company, this could translate into more than 530,000 days of lost working time and roughly $250 million of wasted labor costs per year.”

The big challenge is upping both the quality and speed of decisions. Their survey found that about 57% of respondents agreed that their organizations consistently make high quality decisions (defined as those with odds of success just slightly likelier than a coin toss), 48% of respondents felt their organizations make decisions with high velocity and just 37% say their organizations do both.

There is evidence that you can make high quality and high velocity decisions without compromising on the outcomes. McKinsey identified what they referred to as “winning organizations” -- only 20 percent of respondents — “those making high-quality decisions fast, executing them quickly, and demonstrating higher growth and/or overall returns from their decisions, relative to their peers.” In other words, quality and velocity can coexist to great effect.

A New Imperative for the Market Research Sector

These market forces are trickling down to the insights industry. Companies are moving faster than ever to keep up with changing customers and to stay ahead of competitors. For every major long-term strategic decision, insight is also needed to inform the dozens of more tactical and near-term choices that improve the odds of success. And as the previous data indicates, those are areas where speed is a deficit that must be addressed.

The 2020 GRIT report validates McKinsey’s findings. When you look at clients’ stated needs, they want a more perfect union of business impact from their insight investment, access to innovative technology, credible social science design and analysis, and experienced business consulting expertise to make results more actionable.

As you can imagine, “innovation” and “agility” need to evolve from a pair of buzzwords to an operating imperative for insight firms of the future. How should that come to life? What is the model that makes sense?

It is not an easy question to answer considering these are broad terms with varied interpretations. We are also seeing more and more firms fall into one of two camps: “high tech” (DIY surveys, data collection apps, etc.) or “high touch” (legacy providers, qualitatively driven, strong social science credentials). This represents an old-world view, a choice no longer relevant to today’s modern demands.

The 2020 GRIT report shed light on the subject from a client viewpoint. As with decision making, they want high quality research delivered at the speeds that meet their more compressed timelines. In a sense, innovation is less about choosing between cutting-edge technology, sound methods or the right tools but rather blending them to create the desired outcomes that inform decisions, be they Big Bets, Cross-Cutting or Delegated.

We have done a lot of work with clients who realized the “effective and efficient” solutions they bought into ended up costing them more time and money. Recent conversations shed light on the nature of their struggles:

Data Deluge: “Research vendors like InCrowd and others just give us lots of data but without the distillation of insights that we need to inform strategies.”

Limited Customization: “Data collection partners like Lightspeed provide large samples, but we have to water down the research design given its limitations which mitigates what we get out of the research.”

Lack of Insights Expertise: “We tried to leverage our Agency of Record to synthesize research learnings to save time and money. But they weren’t able to distill the insights and had to start from square one.”

In the end, success in 2021 and beyond requires a unique combination of skills that suppliers need to deliver against:

Speed: Actionable insights in days or weeks, not months
Efficiency: Cost-effective with an attractive ROI
Rigor: Sound, credentialed and credible social science approaches
Effectiveness: Create a transformative outcome to fuel success

While all are not required in equal measure, they are the key ingredients towards better and more business-friendly results today and tomorrow.

Requires a More Imaginative Model

Many companies adopt a buy/build/borrow approach to expand their capabilities. For instance, rival pharmaceutical companies enter into joint agreements to co-market a specific drug, each bringing different talents to the table.

In our case, we have adopted an open architecture that makes us more effective in delivering the quality clients value with the efficiencies their timelines demand. This approach manifests in a few different areas of our business model:

Multidisciplinary Teams: We all know that diversity is our strength, which includes talents and backgrounds. That is why we combine the skills of social scientists, data analysts and business strategists to deliver the best outcomes for our clients. Real-world experience plus research design expertise means we can move in a more inductive fashion, pressure testing hypotheses rather than going on broad fishing expeditions.
Multidimensional Next-Gen Methods: Our approaches are akin to T-shaped talent, offering multiple utility that delivers more comprehensive results in timely, efficient ways. Clients need to validate ideas, so we blend evaluation with generative opportunities for more holistic optimization. People are both rational and irrational, so we make sure to isolate and explore both in the same studies to offer a more well-rounded and honest perspective. Even our qualitative research has a quantitative component, and vice versa. All of this breeds the quality and efficiency that is in high demand.
Powerful Technology Alliances: We have proprietary machine learning and AI tools manned by brilliant data analysts, a stellar combination of IQ and EQ. We have also formed alliances with outside companies, leveraging their technology to complement our arsenal. These partnerships have given us a unique perspective in terms of aligning the right tech with the right issues, a frequent area of consultation with our clients.

Melding high tech + high touch affords greater flexibility and creativity when it comes to finding opportunity and solving problems.

Lessons We’ve Learned Along the Way

We work with a cross-section of companies in terms of industries, organizational structures and competitive intensity, and with that have found some common themes tied to upping one’s agility quotient. The following are those lessons framed in real-world challenges we helped them tackle.

1. Get Specific on the Problem to Solve: How a better question led to a smarter research design

Being agile and efficient means framing a problem very specifically. As the phrase goes, “A problem well-articulated is a problem half solved.”

In this case, an R&D team was developing a new oral administration in a therapeutic area where patients struggled with adherence and compliance. They quickly needed very specific guidance on the optimal pill size and frequency of dosing that would drive compliance and reduce the burden.

The client originally planned to use InCrowd as it was faster and cheaper than alternatives. However, that design would not sufficiently answer the problem given the scope of the questions and sample size needed to instill stakeholder confidence.

We were able to design a more effective approach that included sending physical capsules to respondents for more realistic feedback on their preferences. In the end, our design, execution and reporting delivered the speed, cost-efficiency and rigor they needed.

2. Tap the Value of Existing Research: Pairing human & artificial intelligence to find fresh insight in old data

While we love doing new research, we’ve also discovered ways to save time and energy by looking at existing data through a new lens and with new technology.

One of our clients was under pressure to change the fortunes of an underperforming breast cancer treatment. Despite heavy MR investments they were unconvinced they had a clear path towards a solution. Before we spent dollar one on new research we felt the best first step was to mine existing data to see if they missed anything important.

We inputted raw qualitative data into S+R AQuA™, our qualitative analytics engine then paired that data set with Luminoso, a machine learning tool from MIT that identifies themes and patterns in unstructured data. We explored common threads, tested hypotheses, and dug deeper into unexpected connections that Luminoso identified. Human analysis, close collaboration, and access to all previous research reports gave us the necessary context to separate the new from the known.

As it turned out, there was a neglected barrier tied to physicians' real motivations which was originally dismissed due to inaccurate reporting. A tidy and quick effort resulted in a clear set of new hypotheses and a precise view of what to do next, all by tapping the past to go forward faster.

3. Borrow a More Effective Tool: How a proactive alliance helped deliver a better answer for an upstart CBD brand

It’s common to have on-staff moderators plus a deep bench of talent at the ready. We do the same with research technology, forging proactive partnerships to be ready with the right answer.

Our client was set to launch a new CBD pet product with a major national retailer. Time was of the essence and they needed proof that a chosen design would actually drive notice and interest in the real world.

We had a partner that fit the bill in FastFocus, an online/mobile platform that uses virtual currency and scarcity to simulate real-world dynamics. Client and competitor packages were put into a bidding war in which respondents invested in the one they felt would be successful, far more instructive than your usual attitudinal assessment of an idea.

Our client’s packages underperformed competitors and were also misaligned with the brand’s identity. That plus our MarCom experience led to quick improvements to their graphics, user instructions and iconography.

4. Get Ideas Ready for Action: How accounting for incoming biases expedited more effective outcomes

Ideas testing is always a challenge in that it can take multiple steps to get to an effective approach. However, proactively prepping them based on deep insight into human decision making can help remove steps and boost impact.

A new oncology drug that would significantly improve outcomes for later line patients faced two challenges. First, convincing HCPs the complex logistics and brand-new MOA were worth the trouble. Second, persuading two very different physician types – referrers and treaters -- to come on board.

The typical approach would include a phase or two of qualitative to get some insight that would inform their ideas. However, we cut to the chase by partnering with Newristics, a firm expert in identifying and applying heuristics (i.e., cognitive biases) that more persuasively frame messages and creative concepts. Their proprietary algorithm took into consideration the disease/category, treatment landscape and HCPs involved to identify the top heuristics, allowing us to test, learn and optimize in real time.

Feedback uncovered three core heuristics. When applied to the original messages these new articulations were significantly more persuasive. As for the different physicians, we discovered important ties and distinctions that help the agency navigate towards a common and powerful positioning.

Keys to Research with High Quality and High Velocity

There is no denying the faster pace of decision making, but that does not mean sacrificing quality to get there. As you consider how best to bring these new imperatives into your organization, the following principles can help get you a few steps closer to that reality.

Get specific on the problem(s) to solve: It will inform more precise approaches and designs that get you answers you need…now
Squeeze the juice out of existing knowledge: Don’t start from scratch with new research until you’ve looked under every rock, which obviously saves time and money
Proactively contract with outside experts: Waiting until you have a problem means waiting to get the answers, so apply forethought to build an arsenal you can tap at a moment’s notice
Prepare ideas for action: Fortify concepts before you go into testing so you come out with ideas ready to breakthrough and persuade

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S+R is a research and strategy firm that uses social and behavioral sciences to solve the toughest business and marketing challenges. Our next-gen methods dig deep to unlock market-ready insights. Then our brand planners turn these into strategic marketplace actions that create brand evolution and innovation; customer experiences and loyalty; and new platforms for growth.

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