In the article, “Should Top Management Get Involved
in Market Information Collection Efforts,” the authors argue that top
management teams should be involved in market information collection efforts. They validated this idea off of a sampling of
95 companies in Israel. In this study, a
standardized interview was given to one manager per company. They found that the more involved in marketing
information collection the top management was the stronger the firm’s
innovativeness was. Based on these
results, the authors believe that top management teams should be involved in
market information collection, instead of leaving this task solely in the hands
of regular employees.
Market information collection is important because
it aids companies in assessing their customers, analyzing competitor
environments, and making key decisions.
It is understandable that the study found that top management teams
should be involved in the marketing aspect of the firm. Market information
collection is essential to a firm because the information collected provides
companies the knowledge needed to understand how to improve customer
satisfaction and gain a completive advantage among their competitors. The more knowledge the company has about the
customer target market, demographics, and customers needs and wants, the more
successful a company will be. In my opinion, top management teams need to be
personally involved in this process because they are the ones finalizing decisions. Customer loyalty is dependent on a company’s
reach and satisfaction. As the authors
of the article had hypothesized and confirmed with their studies, top
management team involvement results in superior decisions and improved success.
As the article states, “Market information can
provide the basis for shared values and beliefs in market-oriented firms,
determine employee behavior and help them better understand their environment
and their organization” (Harmancioglu, et. all, p.47). The authors of the article found that market
information was more important for small sized firms that were in high-tech
environments. This makes sense because
the more complicated a business is the more information that is needed to make
decisions.
As the authors stated, top management teams must start
getting involved in market collection and by doing so they will be able to make
better decision that will help improve success in the company. By making better informed decisions based on
this research, business performance will increase as well as communication
between the firm and their customers.
Article Link: http://libproxy.uhcl.edu:2057/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?sid=8cc0635f-fcd9-4d6a-be47-d63f7f9c71c1%40sessionmgr14&vid=7&hid=8
Work Cited:
Harmancioglu, Nukhet, Amir Grinstein, and Arieh Goldman.
"Should Top Management Get Involved
In Market Information Collection Efforts?." Gfk-Marketing Intelligence Review 3.2 (2011):
45-49. Business Source Complete. Web. 24 June 2012.
I agree with your opinion management should be involved no matter the size of the firm. In order for them to make clear and accurate decisions they have to understand and be involved in the information market.
ReplyDeleteAt first glance the idea of top management being involved in the information collecting process would seem obvious. However when you think about it top management does tend to delegate such task to lower level employees and think to themselves I will be responsible for analyzing the information that is turned in to me. It makes sense that if top management is involved from the beginning the results will be better understood and beneficial to the company.
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