Strategic Security and Analysis

Competitive Business Intelligence

Business intelligence units monitor a broad range of activities and developments across a business sector that could affect the intelligence customer. The term can be used as an umbrella for more focused intelligence programs.

Competitive intelligence, for example, is a much narrower effort that focuses on more direct threats to the customer. It targets products and services for analysis that are within a business sector and are similar to those offered by the customer business.

Competitor profiling involves applying the intelligence cycle to a specific business entity. This is a more extensive effort than market research which tends to focus consumer preferences.

Applying the intelligence process to business occurs for one basic purpose - to gain an advantage. This is critical, particularly in highly active, information intensive business sectors with fast moving product cycles. Business intelligence allows managers to shape the way market forces impact their companies. It creates the opportunity for smart company leaders to be proactive in defining products, services, strategies, and tactics in a way that gives them the competitive edge.

Intelligence-Led Law Enforcement

Intelligence-led policing is a new architecture. It is a collaborative enterprise based on improved intelligence operations and community-oriented policing and problem solving, which the field has considered beneficial for many years. To implement intelligence-led policing, police organizations and agencies need to reevaluate their current policies and protocols. Intelligence must be incorporated into the planning process to reflect community problems and issues. Information sharing must become a policy, not an informal practice.

Most important, intelligence must be contingent on quality analysis of data. The development of analytical techniques, training, and technical assistance needs to be supported. Because of size and limited budgets, not all agencies can employ intelligence analysts or intelligence officers. Nonetheless, all law enforcement agencies have a role in the transformation of national intelligence operations.

Law enforcement and intelligence utilize very distinct perspectives. Law enforcement operates to build a case and make an arrest. In other words, it focuses on collection and analysis for purposes of a successful prosecution. Some local law enforcement agencies are large enough to have criminal analysts. These agencies have the benefit of additional processing of information for the purpose of identifying trends and measuring progress.

Intelligence is a continuing cycle of planning, collection, processing, analysis and production, and dissemination. Small departments manage some elements of the intelligence cycle through official briefings and even casual word of mouth. Generally, local law enforcement culture does not lend itself to intelligence unit operations. The term 'intelligence' sounds outside of the law enforcement scope.

Post 9/11, this cultural resistance is beginning to relent. In one municipal police department, a patrol officer made a simple traffic arrest that yielded an unexpected result. Unusual documents in the vehicle led to a search warrant for the suspect's apartment. There was very little inside the apartment except a few pieces of furniture, a big screen television, and Boeing 727 flight simulator. The suspect was turned over to a federal agency. This astute police officer had been well-briefed by his department.

It is critical for law enforcement departments and agencies large and small to understand that they are all critical to the national strategic security. Joint task forces, liaisons to other agencies, regional information sharing, and an internal understanding of the intelligence process are all important elements of law enforcement integration.

Political Risk Assessment

Many situations encountered by cost professionals involve uncertainty. These situations may be as probabilistic as they are deterministic. In other words, the cost professional may be called upon to determine the expected capital cost of a new, international venture, but also determine the probability that the cost will be more or less than the determined baseline value of the venture. This is a type of risk assessment that is familiar to many cost professionals. However, the diligent assessment of risk can extend beyond base capital cost. In many cases, it should include an assessment of economic, financial, and political factors that may influence the business climate where a substantial project may be undertaken.

The concept of country and political risk assessment has been around since the beginning of trade and merchant activity. It can be described as an awareness of the likelihood that specific rules or circumstances may change in a way that adversely affects a financial endeavor. Traditionally, political risk assessment involves international emerging markets. However, it can also be required prior to committing financial backing for projects in the U.S.

Country and political risk assessment is much more than an assessment based on experience. It is a set of factors and their probabilities that are relevant to the project or venture at issue. Political risk insurance alone is not actual risk management. Although it can be a risk management tool, it is generally part of the crisis management and recovery plan. Whether this type of risk is found in legislative activity, project political environments, or international projects, undiscovered political risk can blindside owners and investors. Fortunately, there is expertise available to assess and analyze macro-economic, financial, and political risk factors.

Strategic security and analysis require multi-disciplinary skills and experience with applicable cyclic operations. Legis Consultancy possesses the analytical skill and experience to conduct such operations.