Seena Sharp has been invited by companies, business groups, and conferences, globally, to teach the components of competitive advantage—or to help managers rethink their approach to competitive intelligence strategy. Audiences always leave surprised at the changes that are crucial to their business. Seena received a standing ovation from 400+ conference attendees in Brazil and ranked #1 out of 87 speakers at a professional conference in the US.
She is recognized by her peers as a thought leader in CI. And by John Wiley publishers who invited her to write Competitive Intelligence Advantage: How to Minimize Risk, Avoid Surprises, and Grow Your Business in a Changing World, the highest rated book about CI on Amazon.
Seena’s pragmatic and provocative presentations include numerous real-world business examples and are tailored to your audience. Her most popular talks include:
Hindsight, Insight, Foresight: The Growth Trifecta
Competitive intelligence saves money or makes money—every time. Really! Experience and data used to be the foundation for good decisions. Not anymore. These represent the past and may no longer be true; further, they don’t include what’s changing and emerging. Intelligence saves money by minimizing risk and avoiding mistakes. It makes money by uncovering growth opportunities. Let us regale you with example after example of how this can work for you.
Successful companies invest in current evidence, reducing risk, and uncovering opportunities before competitors learn them. Rethink, reboot, reality, results.
• Did a competitor or new company successfully introduce a new product, service, or feature that your company never even considered?
• Do you still rely on gut instinct and past successes—and later learn that wasn’t what customers wanted?
• Are customers buying from substitute or indirect competitors that you dismissed?
• Have you grown your business in the last 3 or 5 years with atypical customers (who are buying but don’t fit the target profile), alternative uses, or unconventional distribution channels?
• What new, external factors are impacting your business?
This presentation may include a segment on why it’s not enough to have information; it must be the right information, including strategic and insightful perspectives. And it’s rarely available from the Internet, databases, software, or market research.
Other segments may include myths, applications, sources, why competitors are not as important as companies believe. And what input is most important. Your customized presentation will fit the available time and your audience’s needs. Program offerings range from keynotes to 45-minute presentations to full-day interactive workshops.
The Young & the Restless: How Millennials Are Key to Growing Your Business
Whatever you’re thinking, you’re right! And you’re wrong! Very few executives over 40 understand Millennials. They’re crucial to business today as they already account for more than 50% of the workforce and will be 75% of the workforce in less than 10 years. Just as the Baby Boomers were totally different from previous generations, and impacted every new phase they entered in significant ways, so are Millennials – today. They’re not kids!
If you don’t understand what’s true about this group, you’re missing an underestimated or unknown opportunity. Be prepared to be surprised—really surprised—about who they are and how they’re crucial to the grown of your organization or your client’s organization. Yes, they’re annoying, entitled, and tech-savvy, but there’s so much more.
They’re your customers, vendors, employees, and influencers. They differ in attitude and behavior from previous generations, and (surprise!) these differences represent what all adults want in the younger generation. But it looks different. You know all the negatives; now learn all their positive traits and how you can turn these 75 million to your advantage.
Hiding in Plain Sight: 6 Techniques That Beat Predicting or Forecasting
The market is changing in unexpected, unforeseen, surprising, and unpredictable ways. The burning question for decision-makers is to know what’s next, to continually satisfy existing customers, attract new customers, outmaneuver competitors, and avoid being blindsided.
The good news is we can see what’s around the corner. But it requires different thinking and approaches to what’s unfolding and already happening. Predicting and forecasting are increasingly unreliable as they are built on what’s already occurred, or guessing about what will happen. How well does that work today? We can prove there’s a better, easy way, demonstrated with dozens of business examples.
Learn six techniques that are logical, and easy to understand and apply. Identify opportunities that already result in sales, but are unknown. They’re emerging, below the radar, and have not yet been measured—but that doesn’t mean they’re not real or delivering growth results.
Every attendee will receive a copy of Shake Up Your Thinking, Shape Up Your Business, 88 slim pages of idea-generators, regardless of industry
Skim the list of past audiences and read what people say after a Sharp session. To book Seena Sharp at your event, email Sharp Market Intelligence.