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What Does An Industry Analyst Do?
Information Technology Industry Analysts provide their clients with advice on their IT strategy (for enterprises or government) and product strategy (for vendors). There are about 2,500 industry analysts in the U.S. working at advisory research firms such as the Gartner Group, Forrester Research, and IDC.
Each industry analyst is assigned one or more coverage areas. Senior analysts cover a broader range of topics. For a senior analyst, their value becomes the problem-solving ability - the set of principles, axioms, and heuristics - they acquire from hundreds of advisory discussions.
Industry analysts divide their time between 5 tasks:
Advisory |
For META Group, advisory calls were hour long teleconferences. The analyst starts with a two sentence description of the client's problem forwarded from Client Services. At the start of the call the client expounds on the problem, the analyst probes for key decision factors and describes applicable trends, best practice solutions, or solution frameworks. By the end of the hour must leave the client with a solution, shortlist, or direction. | Mr. Roth averaged 325 advisory inquiries per year. This represents about 200 organizations. |
Research |
Primary research is done through information requests to the Research Librarian, regular reading of industry journals, press releases, informational conversations with vendors, and META-driven research surveys. For senior analysts, the large number of advisory conversations acts as a prime source research into problems, trends, and best/worst practices in the client base. | Mr. Roth led the Portal METASpectrum survey for 4 years, a BPM study, a browser survey, and 2 portal studies |
Public Speaking |
As analysts become seen as industry experts in their field of coverage they are expected to speak more at conferences, workshops, and boardroom presentations. Presentations are generally on trends, best practices, and market analysis. | Mr. Roth presented at many META Group conferences and events such as the IMG Enterprise Web Conference, DCI Web Services, Conference, and events for Plumtree, SilverStream, SAP, Backweb, Jacada |
Writing |
Written deliverables differ by analyst firm. For META Group they were delivered as one paragraph weekly fax pieces, 2 page summaries, and 5-7 page white papers. | Mr Roth ranked in the top 25 for written deliverable production. He wrote over 140 pieces for META Group. |
Consulting |
While most analyst's work is done on yearly retainer, analysts sometimes act as consultants for limited engagements. They are sometimes paired with a full-time consultant who bills at a lower rate and can dedicate more time to interviewing and writing longer deliverables. Analysts are not expected to be more than 5-10% billable since their high rate is justified by the advisory and research activities they do on retainer. | Mr. Roth completed 12 engagements in 2004. |
Note: The proportions of an industry analyst's job differ by firm and level at the firm. For example, Gartner Group analysts are heavily weighted towards writing while IDC analysts spend a greater proportion of their time on research. Junior analysts spend more time on primary research while senior analysts spend more time on advisory, consulting, and public speaking.
What is Enterprise Strategy?
A common response to the statement "I do IT Strategy" is "What do you mean by 'Strategy'?". The word "strategy" has been overused and sometimes even abused by practitioners who incorrectly use the term as a proxy for importance. In reality, the only useful strategies are those that actually translate into successful implementation-level decisions.
When analysts talk about strategic decisions they are referring to those that apply to many situations whereas tactical decisions apply to a single situation. In a sense, a strategy maker attempts to solve many problems of a particular type at one time. Strategy often provides a framework for making many tactical decisions that are currently in front of the decision maker or that can be applied to future unknown issues that may arise.
However, what counts as "strategy" is in the eye of the beholder. Depending on the scope of the decision maker, a declaration may be strategic to them but tactical to others. For example, the decision for a particular IT project team to use Java is strategic to them (it applies to many programmers and many modules that will be coded), but tactical to the enterprise as a whole. A decision that all projects at a company will use Java is strategic to the enterprise, hence "enterprise strategy" would be a more specific term for what industry analysts study.