The nature of intelligence operations within organizational settings is rapidly changing. While governments have long histories of developing specialized units with extensive collection and analysis capabilities, growing numbers of globally active corporations are emphasizing their need for similar capabilities. Internationally active non-profit and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are also experiencing expanded collection and analysis needs. Since neither businesses nor NGOs can reliably depend on “official” support for defensive risk-analysis and proactive intelligence needs they are increasingly developing in-house operations.

The emergence of in-house operations is changing the intelligence environment, as the relationships among institutional actors shift and the nature of organizational collection and analysis needs is redefined. It is precisely this growing awareness amidst an environment of shifting institutional relationships that offers an excellent climate for acquiring or enhancing the skills needed to develop a solid career in the emerging discipline of competitive intelligence.