Companies have personalities and characteristics, just like the people that work for them. 

When you are looking for nuggets of insightful information about companies, you need to think like the company, and the type of character that the company is.

As a legal researcher, it was always handy to think about how a judge would phrase legal concepts to quickly find relevant cases.

The same skill – thinking like the source of the information – helps the researcher to consider why the company is, or isn’t revealing details about their operations or plans.

Competitor analysis projects always reveal some of the quirks of companies.

A recent Carine Research project compared six large Australian companies and their drivers, strategies, capabilities and assumptions regarding the use of an innovative technology in their industry.

All of the targets for information were well known Australian companies in their industry, yet each company showed their distinct character in how they revealed insights into their operations and plans.

• The bold company loved being out front talking about goals, strategies, capabilities, and their view of their industry.

• The bashful business reluctantly told the market the bare minimum to satisfy their reporting requirements.

• The swift company was careful to only be talking about short-term goals and how quickly they can respond to changing conditions.

• The pack player stayed with the group and revealed just enough about their company not to attract too much attention.

• The aggressive enterprise talked about their plans to conquer, and strategies for overcoming weaknesses.

• The cunning business showed that they were long term thinkers with clear goals and well-crafted strategies to get there.

When you need to find insightful information about companies in your area of interest, it pays to think about the quirks of the company.

Their quirks will help to explain why you can, or can’t find information about the company, and why they are talking or holding back on their valuable commercial information.