Information and information research, interpretation and use can no longer be considered within a strictly national framework. This brings some urgency to understanding other cultures and prompts the use of tools that permit a multilingual vision of knowledge. Information is becoming more and more open and accessible, going hand in hand with the need for a multidisciplinary approach to the problems that need to be solved. This requires looking beyond very specialized but closed systems and integrating into strategic thinking multiple aspects of intelligence: scientific, technological, economic, organizational, societal and cultural.

At the same time, technology enables the research, analysis and diffusion of information in real time to multiple stakeholders. This dynamic is becoming an essential lever in the transformation of business and organizations by opening up their capacity for world intelligence, new innovation ecosystems and unprecedented ruptures.

One of the significant consequences of this mutation is that it obliges the decider to place it at the heart of their system for decision making and strategic governance. It in fact obliges them to adopt a resolutely anticipatory posture, to define a realistic and detailed vision placing “data control” and analysis at the heart of all strategies.

Digital transition has always accompanied the evolution of economic intelligence, but technological evolutions, changes in the international environment and intense competition are leading to a real rupture. This is acquiring a critical character which must generate within businesses a capacity for resilience through this breakthrough innovation.

In particular, strategic information, its collection, analysis and understanding will create, within businesses and organizations, “self-criticisms”, which are transmissible and generate the mutation needed to understand, interpret and act in a moving and ever more complex world.

Henri DOU

Alain JUILLET

Philippe CLERC

January 2019