Organizational Levels of Intelligence Analysis- Valutrics

Intelligence analysis takes place at multiple levels within an organization. The three most common are strategic, tactical, and operational. These match the decision location and decision-maker components.

Strategic Intelligence Analysis (SIA)

Strategic Intelligence Analysis provides a framework within which other forms of intelligence collection and analysis take place. It helps to detect important trends, to identify and extract patterns that would otherwise not be visible, and to provide an overall picture of the evolving opportunity and threat environment. SIA also provides guidance for tactical and operational assessments, and work done at these levels in turn helps to shape the strategic intelligence focus. As strategic analytic methodologies mature, they will also offer the basis for predictive or anticipatory assessments that can serve to provide warning of potential high-impact activities.

Generic analytical initiatives that would fall under the rubric of strategic intelligence analysis include the following:

• Opportunity and Threat (O&T) Assessments—Used to assess the levels of dependence and vulnerabilities of critical issues, competitive changes that could cause significant impact, and the likelihood of such activities taking place.
• Sector/Competitor Assessments—Focus on emerging or threatening competitors that provide strong potential for impacting the competitive terrain.
• Trend Analyses—Baseline assessments to better recognize departures from current practice, especially those that shape the industry’s future.
• Anomaly Detection—Requires systematic “environmental scanning,” as well as the coalescing of tactical and operational intelligence reports that identify and highlight specific deviations from the norm.
• Impact Assessments—The macro-level view taken in SIA offers a good approach for assessing probable cascade effects of threatening competitive action and activity.

Tactical Intelligence Analysis (TIA)

Tactical Intelligence Analysis is an important complement  the strategic level. It provides a link between macro- and micro-level analysis. Although SIA provides the framework for TIA, these assessments in turn feed SIA. With a dynamic symbiotic relationship between the two, mutual strength is derived.

Typical techniques used in TIA are the following:

• Cluster and Pattern Analysis—Identifies the use of particular marketplace attack methods, commonalities of targets, and attempts to build profiles of competitors.
• Stimulus-Response Analysis—Identifies actions that could be taken by competitors in response to specific events. This analysis could be used both proactively to develop warnings or reactively to design future tactics.
• Value Constellation Analysis—Identifies the key stakeholders, important partners, allies, joint venture prospects, outsourcing potential, and agents that a company could utilize.

Operational Intelligence Analysis (OIA)

Operational Intelligence Analysis is often event-centric and single-case-oriented. It provides more immediate but lesser-lasting benefits and typically involves technological assessments of methods used for marketplace battles or investigations of competitive threats. It is frequently focused on helping the analyst understand in real-time a particular event; such as a competitor who is attempting to perform competitive intelligence efforts of your enterprise. This can be especially helpful for counter-intelligence and can keep your company’s efforts from being prematurely disclosed.

An important component of OIA is vulnerability analysis and recommending how these can be minimized or eliminated. Vulnerability analysis can be used to look both at the enterprise’s marketplace vulnerabilities as well as, more tactically, the competitive intelligence process being employed.