Info-Tech Research Group is introducing what a senior executive describes as an API-driven advisory experience to better serve its membership of chief information officers in making strategic technology decisions.
Speaking at the analyst firm’s Toronto conference this week, Info-Tech senior vice-president of sales strategy and innovation Davin Juusola provided an overview of its CIO Analytics AI Platform, which will combine data, BI and AI to provide greater context to its researchers throughout their engagement with members.
“We are moving from episodic advice to persistent connection,” Juusola told the crowd, explaining that the platform would let analysts avoid having to start from ground zero every time they work with a client. Instead, Info-Tech members who provide access to their data through APIs will allow the Info-Tech platform to arm analysts with an informed point of view at the outset.
Juusola compared the shift to the healthcare system, where patients often have to move from one specialist or care provider to another without having valuable medical information travelling with them. With the platform’s service desk module, for instance, an Info-Tech analyst would be able to raw upon a member’s ticket data to better understand where IT service management (ITSM) could improve and adapt strategies as the data changes.
The platform’s next module will focus on application discovery, helping Info-Tech analysts guide IT leaders in identifying how many tools within their organizations aren’t being properly managed. This will help address longstanding concerns about “shadow IT,” eliminate unused licenses and centralize vendor management, Juusola said.
The CIO Analytics AI platform is an unusual instance of an analyst firm offering something other than reports based on survey data, dedicated guidance from experts and invite-only conferences. That said, Juusola made it clear Info-Tech wasn’t interested in competing with other vendors.
“We don’t want to become a software company. We want to continue to be an advisory company,” Juusola told 360 Magazine in an interview. “But how about we start from a place of knowledge rather than a place of trying to pull the knowledge out of you?”
Using APIs means Info-Tech clients keep their existing software platforms and tools, and all will retain full control over their data and how it’s shared, Juusola said. “It’s similar to the idea that a doctor would not want to ‘become’ an Apple Watch, but they would probably like access to the (health-care) data on one,” he explained.
What won’t change in the advisory experience is the need for an analyst to ask CIOs smart discovery questions, and for the CIO to share insights about their challenges. The platform is simply a way to spend less time diagnosing problems and accelerate the process of taking actions that provide value, Juusola said.
No one will be forced to use the CIO Analytics AI platform, but so far Juusola said he and his team have been taken aback at members’ eagerness to explore the new experience.
“They would give us their data in Excel, but to connect in through an API feels like a different level of trust,” he noted.
Part of that trust is based on the premise that Info-Tech, like other analyst advisory firms, offers vendor-neutral opinions and guidance. Juusola told the conference less than five per cent of Info-Tech’s revenue comes from technology companies, which means the integrity of its experts’ recommendations won’t be compromised.
Whereas other CX initiatives are measured by Net Promoter Score (NPS) or customer satisfaction (CSAT), Juusola said the return on investment (ROI) for the CIO Analytics AI platform will largely be calculated based on member renewal rates and feedback on how it improves the advice its analysts offer.
“Let’s face it, AI has put the legacy advisory model under threat,” he said. “We think – and our customers keep telling us this – they will still want that human delivering the insight. They don’t want AI slop delivering it.”