Business and Competitive Analysis: Effective Application of New and Classic Methods

This generation's definitive guide to business and competitive analysis has now been thoroughly updated with additional methods, applications and examples. Like the first edition, Business and Competitive Analysis, Second Edition helps you transform data into actionable insights and recommendations that enterprise decision makers cannot and will not ignore. Craig S. Fleisher and Babette E. Bensoussan begin with a practical primer on the process and context of business and competitive analysis: how it works, how to avoid pitfalls, and how to communicate results. Next, they introduce their unique FAROUT method for choosing the right tools for each assignment. The authors then present dozens of today's most valuable analysis methods. They cover "classic" techniques, such as McKinsey 7S and industry analysis, as well as emerging techniques from multiple disciplines: economics, corporate finance, sociology, anthropology, and the intelligence and futurist communities. For each, they present clear descriptions, background context, strategic rationales, strengths, weaknesses, step-by-step instructions, and references. The result is a book you can rely on to meet any analysis challenge, no matter how complex or novel.

Authors Fleisher and Bensoussan are uniquely placed as experts in the field of business and competitive analysis. They have extensive corporate consulting, research, and teaching experience in both strategy and intelligence fields, and have both published and spoken internationally. Their collaboration also brings the book a healthy balance of both theory and application.

Craig S. Fleisher is the Chief Learning Officer and Director of Professional Development, Aurora WDC, Madison, Wisconsin, USA. Craig was President of the Board of Directors of the international Strategic and Competitive Intelligence Professionals (SCIP), Chair of the Board of Trustees of the Competitive Intelligence Foundation (Washington, DC), founding Editor of the Journal of Competitive Intelligence and Management, and is a SCIP Meritorious Award winner and Fellow. Author or editor of a dozen books and scores of scholarly articles and chapters, Craig is among the top-cited Google Scholars in several fields, and contributes on several scholarly journals’ editorial boards. He was recognized as one of Canada’s top MBA professors by Canadian Business magazine, is named in the Canadian Who’s Who, and has taught university and executive courses in the strategy, analysis, and competitive intelligence areas for nearly three decades.
   He was formerly a Professor, endowed research Chair, dean, MBA director and/or Institute Chair at the Universities of Calgary, New Brunswick, Windsor, and Wilfrid Laurier in Canada, as well as the College of Coastal Georgia. Craig holds a PhD in Business from the Katz Graduate School of Business, University of Pittsburgh, MBA in Human Resources Management and Marketing from the Owen Graduate School of Management at Vanderbilt University, and his BSBA (Finance, Insurance, and Real Estate) from the University of Florida.
   A well-traveled speaker, he regularly advises leading corporations, associations, and public sector agencies on analysis processes and insight development. Craig holds a Docent appointment in the Dept. of Business Information Mgmt. at Tampere University of Technology (FI), graduate faculty status at the Universita della Svizzera italiana (CH), and visiting positions at universities in eight countries.

Babette E. Bensoussan is an internationally esteemed leader in the field of Competitive Intelligence (CI) and Strategy. Her credentials are built upon a long-standing series of outstanding achievements, both business and academic. She is Australia’s only awarded CI professional and is one of the most published business authors. Throughout her career Babette has excelled as an entrepreneur, a consultant, a company director, a board member, an author, an academic and a business coach.
   In 1992 Babette founded the MindShifts Group, a leading consulting company specializing in Competitive Intelligence and Strategy. As company director Babette has led the MindShifts Group through more than 350 projects with Australian and Fortune 500 companies. Her skills and expertise have been successfully applied to a huge range of industries, and her clients have included (but are not limited to) aerospace, information technology, pharmaceutical, manufacturing, and financial services companies. In 2006 Babette was the recipient of the SCIP Meritorious Award, the world’s most prestigious award in the field of Competitive Intelligence.
   In addition to providing her talent and experience to her clients, Babette has a strong passion for sharing her uniquely honed expertise with others through mentoring and coaching. Author of six books and scores of articles and chapters, she has taught executive courses and held teaching positions at many of Australia’s leading universities and business schools. She is currently an Adjunct Professor in the School of Business at the University of Technology, Sydney.

Their books include Strategic and Competitive Analysis and Analysis Without Paralysis.