Strategic Research & Organizational Assessment Consulting
Some questions can’t be answered with quick analysis or generic advice. You need actual research – systematic investigation that gives you real evidence to inform major decisions. We design and conduct custom research projects that reduce uncertainty about strategic choices where getting the answer wrong would be costly.
MARKET ANALYSIS AND OPPORTUNITY ASSESSMENT
This research reveals both unexpected opportunities leadership might have missed and significant barriers they hadn’t considered. The evidence shows exactly where you could succeed and where you’d likely struggle, giving leadership the foundation for confident strategic decisions.
ORGANIZATIONAL EFFECTIVENESS EVALUATIONS
These evaluations provide objective analysis not influenced by internal politics or preconceived notions about what’s working. You gain clear understanding of organizational strengths to build on and weaknesses that need attention. The research gives you evidence to build internal consensus on difficult decisions about changing how things work.
STAKEHOLDER RESEARCH AND FEASIBILITY STUDIES
This research prevents costly mistakes by identifying problems before you’ve invested heavily in approaches that won’t work. You gain realistic understanding of what implementation will actually require rather than optimistic projections that ignore practical constraints.
WHO NEEDS STRATEGIC RESEARCH
This work proves valuable for any organization facing significant strategic uncertainty where getting the answer wrong would waste substantial resources or miss important opportunities.
HOW WE APPROACH RESEARCH
We conduct the actual research, whether that’s analyzing existing data, interviewing stakeholders, studying comparable situations, or other investigation the methodology requires. Then we analyze and synthesize what we found – identifying patterns, testing hypotheses, and distinguishing signal from noise. This is where research training really matters. We deliver clear findings about what the evidence shows, what it means for your situation, and what we recommend you do based on what we learned.
WHAT YOU GAIN
REAL EXAMPLES
Case Study: Market Expansion Research/h4>
A large industry association hired us to improve member engagement through surveys. Their members were highly accomplished professionals with significant political and economic influence. But when we started, we discovered they couldn’t answer basic questions about their own membership.
They might have someone’s resume in one place, participation records somewhere else, and location data in yet another system. They couldn’t analyze their membership in aggregate or even look at individual members comprehensively.
Why was this a problem? If we conducted a member survey, that data would just become another disconnected file. Why pay a consultant to collect and analyze data the organization could never use again because it was completely isolated from everything else? More importantly, without basic demographic, network, and engagement data already organized, we’d waste the survey asking questions they should already know instead of focusing on what members actually needed and valued.
The culprit: an expensive enterprise software system that didn’t match how the organization actually worked. Staff found it too complex, so everyone maintained separate Excel files instead. The association was paying substantial licensing fees plus hundreds of thousands annually for consultants to continually tweak a system nobody used.
We redesigned the entire process based on how staff actually worked and what they genuinely needed to track. This meant moving to a simpler system that matched their workflow and could consolidate member data into a usable format.
The result: Member data became centralized and analyzable. The association saved hundreds of thousands of dollars annually by ending unnecessary software licensing and consulting contracts. And with comprehensive, organized data, we could design a survey that focused on member needs and interests rather than basic information they should have already known.