In the global and rapidly changing society Environmental scanning is becoming a more and more important tool. Today it is not the availability of information that controls an organizations behavior, but the information that the organization chooses to absorb. This is the case for a multinational cooperation as well as for the local golf club. Swedish golf clubs have during the last 100 years had an amazing development and today there are almost 600 000 registered Swedish golf players. The development has however stopped and even declined some during the last couple of years. This makes it important for golf clubs to actively scan its environment. The purpose with this thesis is to investigate if Swedish golf clubs scan their environment and if they do, describe and analyze how such scanning is conducted. Our secondary purpose is to give recommendations. We have, to fulfill the purpose, conducted a quantitative research based on a telephone questionnaire. We have interviewed 34 randomly stratified selected golf clubs, geographically spread all over Sweden. Conclusions The analysis shows that not even one of four Swedish golf clubs conducts environmental scanning. This at the same time as almost eight of ten clubs state that they believe that environmental scanning is important, or even very important. The analysis also shows that those clubs that have a person responsible for the environmental scanning have fewer members that end their membership, than those that do not have someone responsible. Even though fees from members are the largest source of income for the golf clubs only 21 % of the Swedish golf clubs had any kind of bases for calculation on how many members they could afford to loose before it would result in economic problems. This is especially remarkable as the analysis shows that the number 21 % is misleadingly high as many of the calculations are very vague. The representatives for the clubs give a very pessimistic view on the future, where 61 % believe that the increase of members has stopped or even declined / Omvärldsbevakning är i dagens globala och snabbt förändrande samhälle ett allt viktigare verktyg. Idag är det inte tillgången på information som styr en organisations handlande, utan snarare den information som organisationen valt att ta till sig. Detta gäller det multinationella företaget såväl som den lokala golfklubben. Svenska golfklubbar har under de senaste 100 åren haft en fantastisk utveckling och idag finns det nästan 600 000 registrerade svenska golfspelare. På senare tid har utvecklingen dock avstannat och till och med minskat något. Detta gör det än viktigare för klubbarna att bevaka sin omvärld. Syftet med denna uppsats är att undersöka om svenska golfklubbar bevakar omvärlden och i de fall de gör det är syftet även att beskriva och analysera hur en sådan bevakning går till. Vårt bisyfte är att ge golfklubbar rekommendationer när det gäller omvärldsbevakning. För att uppfylla syftet har vi gjort en kvantitativ undersökning i form av en telefonenkät. Vi har intervjuat 34 stratifierat slumpmässigt utvalda golfklubbar geografiskt utspridda över hela Sverige. Slutsatser Analysen visar att mindre än en av fyra svenska golfklubbar bedriver systematisk bevakning av sin omgivning. Detta samtidigt som nästan åtta av tio klubbar tycker att omvärldsbevakning är viktigt, eller till och med mycket viktigt. Analysen visar vidare att de klubbar som har en person ansvarig för omvärldsbevakning har färre medlemmar som slutar per år än de klubbar som inte har någon ansvarig. Trots att avgifter från medlemmarna är klubbarnas största inkomstkälla har endast 21 % av de svenska golfklubbarna någon form av kalkyl som upplyser om hur många medlemmar klubben kan tappa innan detta resulterar i ekonomiska problem. Detta är extra anmärkningsvärt då analysen visar att siffran 21 % är missvisande högt då många av kalkylerna är ytterst bristfälliga. Klubbarnas representanter ger uttryck för en mycket pessimistisk syn på framtiden, där 61 % tror att medlemsutvecklingen har avstannat, eller till och med minskat.

Firms in highly dynamic environments focusing on innovation in their products and services, often encounter elevated amounts of uncertainty regarding the future direction of technological change. Finding reliable and imbedded information enhances a firm’s ability to tackle new markets and take advantage of possible hidden opportunities. To reduce uncertainty, obtain hidden knowledge, and gain competitive advantage, environmental scanning, which is one of the main components of foresight, is recommended by scholars of strategic management. The process of detecting weak signals for shedding light what one authority calls “blurry future zones” (Day & Schoemaker, 2005, p.1) has currently been receiving attention in environmental scanning studies. Some studies emphasize the importance of the subject; yet they offer few practical methodologies for actual cases. To help address this gap, this research introduces a new approach for detecting weak signals during Internet-based environmental scanning by applying the Cluto toolkit (see Section 4.7) plus using human judgment. This novel methodology is applied to the application of Micro Tiles, a recent innovative product of a digital display company located in Ontario, Canada, Christie Digital Company. In the conduct of this exploratory research, about 40,000 HTML pages were retrieved from the Internet in a search during 2009. To extract weak signals information from the retrieved unstructured texts, documents were grouped into a number of clusters by the CLUTO software. Two subject matter experts compared and evaluated the cluster results for the purpose of finding potentially relevant information in regard to the company’s strategic intent. Analyzing the clusters, the experts reduced the number of clustered documents from the original corpus into smaller sets with the goal of finding more relevant and unexpected documents (weak signals). The relevancy and expectedness of information in documents were two measurements as related to weak signals. The trends of the study indicate that as anticipated both experts found more unexpected documents in the smaller sets rather than the larger ones. Moreover, regarding one expert’s analysis, the smaller sets contain documents that are more relevant to the domain of interest. Overall, according to one expert, documents existing in the smaller sets display more weak signals. This emerging methodology offers a practical procedure to apply web-based information in the development of a company’s environmental scanning procedures. Using this methodology, managers can employ both computer tools and human sense-making methods to detect potential weak signals and reduce certain biases in the detection process.

Thesis (MBA (Business Management))--University of Stellenbosch, 2000. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Historically organisations have had the "luxury" of being able to anticipate future developments and respond to them in good time due to, firstly, the comparatively slow pace of change and, secondly, the past being a relatively good predictor of the future. The second half of the 20th Century bears witness to some of the most dramatic changes and developments experienced by mankind. Most notable of these were globalisation, de-regulation, the emergence of the information/knowledge economy and, perhaps most significant of all, the changes brought about by the Internet. The underlying assertion of this report is that, given the current, complex, dynamic and sometimes volatile nature of changes in the external environment, in order to ensure a sustainable competitive advantage, organisations will be forced to consider carefully the dynamics of the environment in which they operate and to build their plans around these dynamics. This report briefly traces the evolution of strategic planning to its current status prior to providing a detailed analysis of the nature of environmental scanning and its applicability to strategic planning. The report provides a theoretical rerview of environmental scanning and a discussion of some of the tools and techniques of environmental scanning. Within this context the report provides a brief indication of the extent of the practice of environmental scanning within the financial services sector of South Africa. The conclusion assesses the findings of the current state of the practice of environmental scanning against the theory, with the view to providing an insight into the extent to which environmental scanning is applied in South Africa. Possible future directions of research and development of the practice are also identified. / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Histories gesproke, het instansies oor die "luukse" beskik om toekomstige ontwikkelinge vooruit te kon waarneem en betyds op hulle te reageer, eerstens weens die betreklike stadige pas van verandering en tweedens, omdat die verlede 'n betreklike goeie voorspeller van die toekoms was. Die tweede helfte van die 20ste eeu getuig van sommige van die mees dramatiese veranderinge en ontwikkelinge wat deur die mens ondervind is. Die mees uitstaande was globalisering, deregulering, die verskyning van die inligting/kennis-ekonomie en, dalk die mees uitstaande van almal, die veranderinge wat deur die Internet teweeggebring is. Die onderliggende stelling van hierdie verslag is dat, gegewe die huidige, komplekse, dinamiese en soms onbestendige aard van veranderinge in die eksterne omgewing, om 'n mededingende voordeel te verseker, sal instansies geforseer word om die dinamika van die omgewing waarin hulle werk, versigtig te oorweeg en om hulle planne om hierdie dinamika te bou. Hierdie verslag speur kortliks die ewolusie na van strategiese beplanning tot sy huidige status gevolg deur 'n omvattende analise van die aard van omgewingsondersoeke en die toepaslikheid daarvan op strategiese beplanning. Die verslag voorsien 'n teoretiese oorsig tot omgewingsondersoeke en 'n bespreking van sommige van die instrumente en tegnieke van omgewingsondersoeke. Binne hierdie konteks voorsien die verslag 'n kort aanduiding van die omvang van die uitvoering van omgewingsondersoeke binne die finansiele dienstesektor van Suid-Afrika. Die slot som die bevindings op van die huidige toestand van die praktyk van omgewingsondersoeke volgens die teorie, met die oog op voorsiening van 'n insig in die mate waartoe omgewingsondersoeke in Suid-Afrika toegepas word. Moontlike toekomstige rigtings van navorsing en ontwikkeling van die praktyk word ook geidentifiseer.

The aim of this thesis is to investigate how small organisations within the subject field health and training work with their environmental scanning. The main questions in this thesis are: How do the organisations work with business intelligence/environmental scanning? What is their environment like and of which parts does it consist? How extensive is their work with business intelligence/ environmental scanning? Which are their main fields of application and how is the work compiled practically? In order to answer these questions we have chosen to use a qualitative method, which in our case consists of two interviews with people in managerial positions within the health and training subject field. The result of the two interviews is presented in a compilation, and it is thereafter discussed and analyzed. We used an existing theoretical model and altered it in order to correspond to the aim of this research.

É de conhecimento geral que as mudanças ocorridas no contexto global provocaram mudanças profundas na sociedade e, sobretudo, na competitividade das organizações. Hoje, obtém-se vantagem competitiva através da gestão ótima dos conhecimentos organizacionais, representada pela transformação da informação em inteligência. Este movimento tem se fortalecido no ambinte corporativo em função da crescente necessidade dos gestores tomarem decisões mais assertivas em meio à grande quantidade de dados e informações disponíveis. Diante deste cenário, o processo pelo qual as organizações convertem informação em inteligência tem sido tratado como inteligência competitiva (IC). No Brasil, encontram-se diferentes termos que descrevem este processo, como inteligência de mercado e inteligência de negócios. O fato é que, independente da taxonomia utilizada, as iniciativas práticas em termos da implantação de ações organizacionais e pesquisas científicas têm se intensificado ano após ano. Entretanto, ainda se sente a necessidade de um modelo integrado da IC com as demais estruturas teóricas e práticas que seja capaz de facilitar a compreensão deste fenômeno em sua totalidade. Por isso, o presente trabalho desenvolve uma visão holística sobre a IC e, para isso, é utilizado o método de teoria fundamentada (grounded theory) baseado na triangulação de métodos de pesquisa quanti-quali. De um lado, a pesquisa teórica permitiu compreender a relação entre os diversos aspectos conceituais do tema, destacando a análise quantitativa das publicações em IC que identificou os campos de pesquisa e as referências bibliográficas mais relevantes, utilizada para identificar os principais constructos do modelo holístico. De outro lado, os estudos de caso permitiram confirmar a validade de algumas proposições identificadas no referencial teórico para a construção do modelo. Assim, o trabalho oferece a construção de uma visão holística de IC que emerge dos resultados obtidos ao longo do trabalho, constituído sobre métodos científicos. / Transformations in the global context have caused some deep changes in society, specially in organizations competitiveness. Nowadays, it is possible to achieve competitive advantage through an optimal management of organizational knowledge, represented by the transformation of information into intelligence. This tendency has gained strength in the corporate world because of the growing need of managers to make more assertive decisions due to a great quantity of data and information available. Inside this scenario, the process by which organizations convert information into intelligence has been treated as competitive intelligence (CI). In Brazil, the practical initiatives on the implementation of organizational actions and scientific research have intensified year after year. However, an integrated CI model with all the structures, both practical and theoretical is still necessary to facilitate the understanding of this phenomenon in its totality therefore, this project develops a holistic view of CI. It is based on the grounded theory method, composed of quantitative and qualitative researches. On the one hand, the theoretical research allowed understanding the relationship between the conceptual aspects of the theme, highlighting the quantitative analysis of CI publications that identified fields of research and relevant references, used to identify the key constructs of the holistic model. On the other hand, the case studies have allowed confirming the validity of some propositions identified in the theoretical framework. Thus, this project offers the construction of the holistic view of CI that emerges from the results obtained during the work, constituted of scientific methods.

Using external information to gain insights is becoming increasingly important in today’s knowledge based economies. However, from both research and practice it is somewhat unclear how organizations manage these activities. Therefore the purpose of this paper is to explore how four different organizations manage their insight creation process from external information. To do this, a literature review about insight creation is done to create an analytical framework. Based on this framework, the insight creation process is analyzed within the organizations to find characteristics of each process. Next, a cross case analysis is conducted that reveal the main differences between the organizations. The results indicate two main styles of managing the insight creation process that can be differentiated with regards to formality. As such, this paper complements previous research within the area of competitive intelligence and knowledge management in the sense that it increases the understanding of the insight creation process.

Syfte: Åsikterna om Fullriggaren går isär. Gavlegårdarna har, som allmännyttigt bostadsföretag, kritiserats av allmänheten för att bostäderna anses vara för exklusiva. Syftet med studien är att närmare undersöka den omvärldsanalys som legat till grund för det strategiska beslutet att bygga Fullriggaren. Vi vill även skapa oss en uppfattning om hur allmännyttan håller på att förändras och vilken roll den spelat historiskt.Metod: Studien bygger på en kvalitativ metod, med två djupintervjuer som varit av semi-strukturerad karaktär. Vi har även gjort en litteraturstudie av allmännyttans historia. I analysen har sedan empirin tolkats och analyserats mot vår referensram.Resultat & slutsats: Vi har kommit fram till att allmännyttan fortsättningsvis kommer anpassa sig till utvecklingen mot ett mer kvalitativt boende. Vi har även kommit fram till att den omvärldsanalys som legat till grund för Fullriggaren i stort sett är samma omvärldsanalys som den för Gävle Strand. / Aim: Opinions on Fullriggaren differ. Gavlegårdarna, as a public housing company have been criticized by the public because the housing is considered too exclusive. The purpose of this study is to further investigate the environmental scanning that formed the basis for the strategic decision to build Fullriggaren. We also wanted to create an understanding of how public housing is changing and what role it has played historically.Method: The study is based on a qualitative approach, with two in-depth interviews that were of semi structured nature. We have also done a literature study of the public housing history. In the analysis, empirical data have been interpreted and analyzed and compared to our frame of reference.Result & Conclusions: We have found that public housing will continue to adapt to the development towards a more quality accommodation. We have also concluded that the environmental scanning that formed the basis for Fullriggaren in its whole is the same environmental scanning as that of Gävle Strand.

The number of the Palestinian non-governmental organizations (NGOs) has grown substantially in recent years. As the sector has expanded it has experienced a high level of internal competition especially due to scarce donor resources and their requirements such as greater financial accountability and clearer evidence of program influence. Therefore strategic thinking and the use of strategic management approaches are very much needed. While the volume of research on strategic management in large corporations is extensive research on strategic management in SMEs is relatively limited and the research on strategic management in NGOs is very limited. Therefore, following the recommendations of the prior researchers for further studies, this research is an attempt to shed light on the top mangers` perception of the importance of strategic management processes in NGOs in Palestine. This research discovered that more than half of the NGOs surveyed have strategic management systems indicating that a significant proportion of NGOs view strategic management as crucial. Managers of the studied NGOs perceived a strategic management approach as an important factor for increasing the quality of service delivery, achieving goals and increasing overall organizational performance. Regarding the internal organizational factors managers believed that employing strategic management techniques helped significantly in sorting out organizational problems, reducing organizational conflicts and aiding organizational development. The NGOs that have set a strategic management approach are more adjustable to environmental factors. The environmental awareness of managers in NGOs is very important. The managers` strategic awareness and their perception of the III benefits coming from a formal strategic planning approach within the NGO considerably impacts upon the success of the organisation. They perceived environmental scanning as a very important factor for NGO success. Environmental scanning is also perceived as a significant factor in the strategic management process and its impact upon performance. The studied NGOs placed most emphasis on a mission statement followed by evaluating and assessing and developing a vision statement and yearly goals. The respondents considered flexibility, adjustability and organizational development as important elements in implementing strategies. As the size of the NGOs increased their use of strategic management approaches such as developing a mission statement and objectives, annual and long term goals and employing formal strategic planning techniques increased. Managers of NGOs perceived the - value of leadership presented by managers' as the first priority in the factors which are significant for future success. This emphasises the significance of leadership as a crucial factor for success in all organizations in general and in NGOs in particular. In this research it has been recommended that donors from the international community, the Islamic and the Arab world should continue to support Palestinian NGOs. Indeed they have the right to ask the Palestinian NGOs to show transparency, accountability and to be moderate and well managed. On the other hand they should respect the Palestinian national agendas and priorities and not use the assistance being given as a political tool. The Palestinian National Authority should allow NGOs the freedom to operate effectively and ensure that the relationship between NGOs and Palestinian National Authority is a cooperative one.

O mundo dos negócios hoje em dia está cada vez mais competitivo e os consumidores buscam de forma acelerada a satisfação de suas necessidades imediatas. Na sociedade do conhecimento, caracterizada pela alta competitividade e pela necessidade inerente de informações, torna-se necessária a adoção de estratégias que permitam a manutenção das vantagens competitivas sustentáveis adaptadas a cada modelo de negócio das corporações. A reorientação de um modelo de negócios utilizando os conceitos de Inteligência Estratégica Antecipativa é foco deste trabalho. Em relação aos procedimentos metodológicos, realizou-se um estudo de caso com uma pesquisa exploratória em um banco de dados interno no CRM da empresa estudada e em paralelo uma coleta de fichas de captação com clientes desta empresa. Estes dois bancos de dados foram inclusos no software Sphinx®. O resultado deste estudo foi a geração de três exemplos: O primeiro com o objetivo de testar se um grupo de palavras com destaque de aparições pode trazer pistas de serviços a serem criados pela empresa. O segundo tinha o objetivo de testar se palavras com aparição nas fichas de captação podem ter algum tipo de relação com aparições destas mesmas palavras na base de CRM dando assim pistas de novas tecnologias a serem aplicadas/desenvolvidas pela empresa. O terceiro tinha o objetivo de testar se um grupo de palavras vinculadas ao tema “serviços” e agrupadas por região do país poderiam sinalizar prioridade de investimento da empresa para geração de serviços adicionais aos usuários de seus softwares através de uma rede de representantes. A aplicação dos conceitos de IEA em situações reais de uma empresa de software buscando auxiliar o gestor nas decisões estratégicas de uma possível reorientação de um modelo de negócios foi o resultado final apresentado neste trabalho. / Nowadays the world of business is becoming each day more competitive and the consumers are looking at a fast pace to satisfy their immediate necessities. At the knowledge society, characterized for the high competitiveness and the inherent necessity of information, becomes necessary the adoption of strategies that allows the maintenance of the sustainable competitive advantages to each model of business of the corporations. The reorientation of a business model using the Anticipatory and Collective Environmental Scanning concepts is the focus of this work. Related with the methodological procedures, a study case was made with an exploratory research in an internal data base in the CRM of the studied company and in parallel was become fulfilled a collection of captation fiches with customers of this company. These two data bases had been enclosed in the Sphinx® software The result of this study was the production of three cases: The first one with the objective to test if a group of words with prominence of appearances, it means, a great number of events, in a CRM database, can bring clues from services to be created by the company. The objective of the second was to test if words with appearance in the captation fiches can have kind of relation with appearances of these same words in the CRM base, thus giving clues of new technologies to be applied/developed by the company. The third had the objective to test if a group of words entailed to the subject “services” and grouped by region of the country could sign priority of investment of the company for the generation of add services to the users of its softwares through of a net representatives. The application of the concepts of IEA in real situations of a software company searching to help the manager in strategic decisions of a possible reorientation of a business model, was the final result presented in this work.

O mundo dos negócios hoje em dia está cada vez mais competitivo e os consumidores buscam de forma acelerada a satisfação de suas necessidades imediatas. Na sociedade do conhecimento, caracterizada pela alta competitividade e pela necessidade inerente de informações, torna-se necessária a adoção de estratégias que permitam a manutenção das vantagens competitivas sustentáveis adaptadas a cada modelo de negócio das corporações. A reorientação de um modelo de negócios utilizando os conceitos de Inteligência Estratégica Antecipativa é foco deste trabalho. Em relação aos procedimentos metodológicos, realizou-se um estudo de caso com uma pesquisa exploratória em um banco de dados interno no CRM da empresa estudada e em paralelo uma coleta de fichas de captação com clientes desta empresa. Estes dois bancos de dados foram inclusos no software Sphinx®. O resultado deste estudo foi a geração de três exemplos: O primeiro com o objetivo de testar se um grupo de palavras com destaque de aparições pode trazer pistas de serviços a serem criados pela empresa. O segundo tinha o objetivo de testar se palavras com aparição nas fichas de captação podem ter algum tipo de relação com aparições destas mesmas palavras na base de CRM dando assim pistas de novas tecnologias a serem aplicadas/desenvolvidas pela empresa. O terceiro tinha o objetivo de testar se um grupo de palavras vinculadas ao tema “serviços” e agrupadas por região do país poderiam sinalizar prioridade de investimento da empresa para geração de serviços adicionais aos usuários de seus softwares através de uma rede de representantes. A aplicação dos conceitos de IEA em situações reais de uma empresa de software buscando auxiliar o gestor nas decisões estratégicas de uma possível reorientação de um modelo de negócios foi o resultado final apresentado neste trabalho. / Nowadays the world of business is becoming each day more competitive and the consumers are looking at a fast pace to satisfy their immediate necessities. At the knowledge society, characterized for the high competitiveness and the inherent necessity of information, becomes necessary the adoption of strategies that allows the maintenance of the sustainable competitive advantages to each model of business of the corporations. The reorientation of a business model using the Anticipatory and Collective Environmental Scanning concepts is the focus of this work. Related with the methodological procedures, a study case was made with an exploratory research in an internal data base in the CRM of the studied company and in parallel was become fulfilled a collection of captation fiches with customers of this company. These two data bases had been enclosed in the Sphinx® software The result of this study was the production of three cases: The first one with the objective to test if a group of words with prominence of appearances, it means, a great number of events, in a CRM database, can bring clues from services to be created by the company. The objective of the second was to test if words with appearance in the captation fiches can have kind of relation with appearances of these same words in the CRM base, thus giving clues of new technologies to be applied/developed by the company. The third had the objective to test if a group of words entailed to the subject “services” and grouped by region of the country could sign priority of investment of the company for the generation of add services to the users of its softwares through of a net representatives. The application of the concepts of IEA in real situations of a software company searching to help the manager in strategic decisions of a possible reorientation of a business model, was the final result presented in this work.