Locating corporate intelligence (CI) within the Risk Management discipline will provide an informative, practitioner’s perspective of how we operate.
CI is sometimes conflated and confused with other areas of risk management, so it is useful
to locate the boundaries of corporate intelligence within the wider risk management
domain. Corporate intelligence (CI) operates as a professional niche within the broader discipline of
risk management.
We can answer those questions in future articles. Let it suffice for now that we are only talking about situations where management urgently need information to make a critical business decision, and the nature of the decision-point that confronts them means that the information they require is difficult to find through conventional means
Let us review what role a Risk Manager plays. The role of the professional Risk Manager is to “oversee an organization’s comprehensive insurance and risk management program;
- identifying, evaluating, and prioritising risks that could impede the reputation, safety,
security, or financial success of the organization”, and then - develop plans for the coordinated and economical application of resources to minimize,
monitor, and control the probability or impact of unfortunate events or to maximize the
realization of opportunities.
Risk Managers can often source the information they need internally, or from information published about their market space – but what if they cannot find the information they need to identify and evaluate risks/threats?
Finding information to identify and evaluate risks/threats is the foundation competence and contribution of corporate intelligence.
CI vs Investigation
CI is not the only professional discipline that specialises in this Risk Management niche to source missing information that helps to identify and evaluate risks/threats.
CI and Investigation services are frequently conflated; they aim to achieve similar objectives, but rely on very different methodologies and competencies.
- CI exploits methods that can be covert, that lend themselves to secrecy. CI firms
assimilate information from a mosaic of sources – public media, purchased databased,
paper archives in remote locations, official records, human intel – information sources
that are not always restricted to one geographic boundary, or any boundary. - By contrast, Investigation is a forensic exercise – it relies on access to records (digital or analog), or other physical evidence, and subjects this to technical analysis (forensic accounting, statistical analysis, chemical analysis etc) in order to extrapolate or interpret additional information e.g. using a fingerprint to determine identity.
- Investigative methods aim to provide an evidence-based conclusion that meets the exacting standards of admissibility to a Criminal or Civil Court. These exacting standards assume formal access to the records or evidence that is mandated and overt (but not necessarily public).
There is no barrier to CI firms consulting in other areas of risk management, and vice versa, but the distinction acknowledges that different functional niches within risk management rely on different methodologies or competencies.
Given that CI and Investigation firms operate in the niche where the truth is often deliberately concealed, they have a unique perspective on the range of business pathologies caused by malign intent.
The insights gained inform strategies to mitigate risk when structuring a transaction,
changing operational processes, navigating a business threat etc.
