Research That Drives Strategy: How External Insights Guide Organizational Success

Why External Research Matters

Strategic decisions are only as strong as the information that supports them. By integrating external research into the strategy process, organizations can:

• ‍Anticipate Trends: Identify emerging shifts, risks, and opportunities before they disrupt the market.‍
• Benchmark Performance: Measure organizational approaches against best practices across industries and geographies to reveal gaps and opportunities for differentiation.‍
• Engage Stakeholders: Bring in the perspectives of customers, employees, partners, and industry peers to ensure insights reflect real-world needs.‍
• Navigate Uncertainty: Apply data-driven foresight to prepare for multiple futures, reducing reliance on assumptions and increasing resilience.

By aligning strategy with the broader systems in which they operate, organizations ensure their decisions remain relevant, resilient, and future-focused.

Bâton Global’s Research Approach‍

Recognizing why external research matters is only the first step. The next question is how to gather and apply those insights in practice. While each engagement is unique, our research process may draw on a range of methods depending on client needs, such as:

• ‍Environmental and Industry Scanning: Analyzing macroeconomic and microeconomic forces, including demographic shifts, policy changes, and disruptive technologies shaping the external environment. This may include structured frameworks such as PESTLE analysis to ensure key external drivers are systematicallyconsidered.‍
• Stakeholder Insights: Conducting interviews, surveys, and focus groups with customers, employees, partners, and peers to surface unmet needs, areas of alignment, and points of friction.‍
• Competitor and Peer Benchmarking: Studying how peers and competitors are responding to similar challenges to identify innovative models and lessons learned.‍
• Scenario Planning: Exploring possible futures to ensure strategies remain resilient, adaptive, and capable of thriving in multiple conditions.‍
• Ecosystem Analysis: Mapping the broader industry landscape to visualize key nodes and relationships, revealing how different players interact and influence outcomes.

While these approaches generate valuable insights into the external environment, but their true worth emerges when those insights are applied to strategy and action.‍

From Research to Action

The true power of external research lies not in the data itself, but in its ability to drive meaningful action. At B|G, we turn complex findings into clear strategies, helping leaders:

• Craft resilient strategies that address immediate challenges while proactively preparing for future trends and disruptions.
• Align leaders and teams around a shared, evidence-based understanding of external opportunities and risks.
• Build implementation roadmaps that outline concrete steps, timelines, and accountability to move strategies from insight to execution.
• Elevate thought leadership and messaging by equipping leaders with credible, research-backed narratives that resonate with stakeholders.

More broadly, external research provides the foundation for leaders across industries to make informed decisions, build credibility, and drive meaningful impact.

Leading with Insights

External research provides leaders with the evidence, perspective, and credibility needed to engage stakeholders effectively and shape industry conversations. When strategy is grounded in objective analysis, organizations can move beyond internal opinions and assumptions, relying instead on data, foresight, and diverse perspectives. This approach produces strategies that are both credible and resilient.