Which roles make up today’s hybrid Customer Insight Leader?
I was struck by this graphic published by Visually that was trending on Twitter a couple of days ago. Although about marketers, it set me pondering about today’s hybrid Customer Insight leader.
Apart from being an eye catching infographic and ringing true as to the challenge for modern marketers, it prompts an equal or bigger challenge for insight leaders. Over the years this role has evolved into one requiring CI leaders to have an even more hybrid mix of talents than their marketing peers.
The need to wear many hats, if you like (which puts me in mind of De Bono’s thinking hats).
I’d be interested to hear your views, but from my experience I’d say the ideal Customer Insight leader is a hybrid of:
- Data Scientist (as above & overlapping with IT experience);
- Psychologist (for effective use of research & interpretation);
- Creative Artist (for storytelling & data visualisation);
- Sales Person (for selling in the benefits & recommendations);
- Statistician or Economist (creating hypotheses & models);
- People Leader (motivating team and collaborative delivery).
Any I’ve missed?
For consideration of the equivalent balance needed in Data Scientists, see this post on an infographic circulating on them.
Paul, this absolutely hit the nail on the head! As Insight professionals we all need to aspire to deliver against every aspect you’ve outlined.
This is a great info-graphic, not sure how I missed it Paul but I love your interpretation!
I have been talking to folks for a while now that customer insight professionals are no longer the back office “data geeks” and are becoming main-stream roles within organizations and are even being looked upon as stepping stone roles to Chief Marketing Officers and CEO roles.