When Boston Consulting Group (BCG) first studied the management of consumer insights in major corporations in 2009, they developed a four-stage taxonomy to describe the developmental stage of an insights department.

  • Stage 1 represented departments that were either “traditional” or “emerging” – i.e were more in the mode of order-taking and tactical research rather than leading the business with strategic thinking;
  • Stage 2 departments were described as “business contributors”, striving to use research as a means of informing the business without necessarily leading it;
  • Stage 3 represented “Strategic Partners”, departments that led the business through their application of research to key strategic business issues;
  • And Stage 4 departments were those that demonstrably provided strategic competitive advantage.

You can read more about the 4 stages of maturity here.

Many companies struggle to realize the full potential of their customer insight function.  BCG has created a self-assessment tool which enables Insights functions to assess how advanced they are based on the 4-stages of maturity model.

In less than ten minutes, the diagnostic tool guides you through assessing the current state of your company’s customer insight capabilities.

Click here to access the tool.