The evolution of the insights professional
Editor's note: Niels Neudecker is managing director, North America, with Human8. He can be reached at nielsn@wearehuman8.com.
We’re in the middle of a seismic shift in the insights world. Technologies like AI and real-time analytics are defining what’s possible. Every day, new tools and platforms emerge that allow us to reach unprecedented levels of precision and scale in our research. Exciting times where possibilities seem endless!
Yet, alongside these developments comes mounting pressure. Economic uncertainty, evolving consumer behaviors and fierce competition increase the demands upon us to do more with less and at a faster pace. The result? Insights teams must now show up as operational and strategic.
A recent 2025 GRIT Insights Practice Report explained this shift further. Driven by both the natural evolution of the field and the rise of new tools – along with greater access to existing ones – the “data enlightenment” sparked by the pandemic has ushered in what the report described as a “strategic consulting renaissance.” As a result, consulting has once again become the primary focus within the research and analytics sectors.
Here’s the kicker: Amid the race for more data, analytics and automation, insights organizations risk losing the human element of insight, grounded in context, meaning and institutional memory. When this happens, decision-making becomes reactive rather than strategic, missing critical opportunities for innovation.
But there’s good news. Through our global brand work, we’ve pinpointed three pivotal shifts that are transforming the role of the insights professional from data and insights gatherer to proactive driver of change. In this article, we’ll show how to harness each of these shifts and offer guidance on how to adapt and thrive in this new landscape.
Shift 1: From DIY to do-it-together
Do-it-yourself (DIY) research models and user-friendly DIY platforms have empowered anyone in an organization to collect data quickly, cost efficiently and independently. More recently, AI has enabled those same individuals to write polished, convincing reports without the need to analyze the underlying data or insights.
But as budget pressures mount and decision timelines shrink, the ease of DIY research can create new risks. When non-experts work alone, insights can lack context, duplicate existing knowledge or, worse, lead to misguided strategies.
The first major shift is a move away from siloed, do-it-yourself research models toward more collaborative, integrated approaches. As time and budget pressures mount, organizations are increasingly looking to leverage existing data assets before commissioning new research. This is not about cutting corners, it’s about working smarter.
This shift reflects a broader cultural change: Insights professionals are no longer just report writers, they’re strategic partners. By jointly reviewing what is already known – both from a quantitative and qualitative perspective – teams can identify knowledge gaps more effectively and generate hypotheses that guide more targeted, efficient primary research. It’s no longer enough to simply hand off a report. Insights professionals must work hand-in-hand with stakeholders to co-create understanding and drive action.
For example, last year we partnered with a U.S. regional hospital system to launch a large-scale qualitative research study to better understand patient experiences in a post-Covid environment. But rather than starting from scratch, we began with a half-day collaborative workshop, bringing together a cross-functional team from the organization to map the landscape. We explored the existing research, surfaced knowledge gaps and generated hypotheses to understand the desired end-state and drill into the human truths we wish we knew about specific aspects of the patient care experience.
By leveraging this existing data, our path to impactful future insights was illuminated. We then completed 50 60-90-minute in-depth interviews, contextualized the full end-to-end patient journey, identified quick-win opportunities and packaged the insights in a way that was turnkey for the organization.
Your new playbook:
- Audit existing data sources before kicking off new research, using AI tools for faster synthesis.
- Organize cross-functional insight workshops to identify knowledge gaps and align priorities.
- Build shared dashboards that blend AI-powered summaries with expert interpretations.
Shift 2: From big data to thick data
Big data has transformed our ability to track and quantify behavior at an unprecedented scale. With powerful analytics, organizations can see what’s happening in real time, detect emerging patterns and measure performance with precision. This scale has been essential for optimizing marketing, pricing and operations.
Yet as organizations grow more data-rich, they risk becoming insight-poor. Big data alone can reveal what consumers do but not why they do it. This blind spot can lead to strategies that chase trends without understanding motivations or missing signals of cultural shifts altogether.
Enter thick data.
Thick data combines the scale of big data with the richness of human-centered insight. Thanks to AI-enabled qual-at-scale tools, organizations can now gather thousands of qualitative inputs – selfie videos, chat transcripts, open-ended responses – and process them quickly to reveal emotions, tensions and cultural contexts at scale.
When thick data is layered with contextual market trends and cultural intelligence, it provides a multidimensional view of the landscape. It tells us not just what is happening but why it’s happening, how it’s evolving and what it might mean for the future. This is the foundation of strategic insight, the kind that drives innovation and informs long-term planning.
We recently incorporated this methodology for a global research project for Hilton, a world leader in the hospitality industry. Seeking to gain deeper understanding of people in the Caribbean and Latin Americas (CALA) region to drive growth, it needed insights that were big – hearing from 3,000 travelers across multiple countries – and thick data that added a layer of cultural understanding.
Through a multipronged approach including an online survey, segmentation and culturally rooted analysis, we were able to uncover critical insights about the CALA region, providing Hilton with a roadmap for future research topics such as how to keep Hilton Honors members engaged once enrolled, how to best tie local areas and cultures into its offerings and more.
The insights not only support human-centered initiatives but also made Hilton consumers feel heard and understood, all of which promotes increased loyalty and growth for the brand.
Your new playbook:
- Map cultural and market trends alongside behavioral data to build richer context.
- Use AI-powered text, image and video analysis to scale qualitative insights.
- Develop insight reports that connect numbers to human stories, helping stakeholders act on what really matters.
Shift 3: From speed to insight to speed to action
The third and perhaps most critical shift is a redefinition of what it means to be fast. For years, the focus has been on accelerating the speed of insight generation. But in today’s hypercompetitive, always-on environment, generating insights quickly isn’t enough. Organizations often find themselves stuck with mountains of reports but little clarity on what to do next. The real competitive advantage lies in accelerating the speed to action.
This means moving beyond analysis to activation. It’s about synthesizing insights across multiple data sources and translating them into clear, commercially relevant strategies. It’s about helping organizations not just understand their environment but how to respond to it – quickly, confidently and effectively.
For insights professionals, this requires a new set of skills. It’s more than being a great researcher or analyst. It’s about being a strategic consultant – someone who can connect the dots, tell a compelling story and recommend a course of action with clarity and conviction.
We recently partnered with the U.K. market of Nestlé brand KitKat which wanted to gain deeper understanding of Gen Z consumers to better inform the work of its advertising agency and fuel a new global ad campaign. To kick off our two-step approach, we launched a six-day online community of 80 consumers that unearthed a universal and meaningful insight resonating with Nestlé’s Gen Z audience across all global markets. We then validated the attitudinal learnings from the Gen Z community through a survey involving 1,500 additional consumers from the same markets. In doing so, we ensured comprehensive validation of our findings and global alignment around these findings.
Because we knew that these insights would be directly funneled to VML, Nestlé’s ad agency, we then tailored our deliverables in a way that was easily and efficiently consumable to creative stakeholders as opposed to a C-suite boardroom. By narrowing in on the single universal human truth that we found among Gen Z adults and packaging it in a creative yet simple format, we helped the creative agency swiftly take the insights and develop a new global campaign titled “Break Better.”
Your new playbook:
- Design insight reports with recommended actions tied directly to business priorities.
- Build alignment sessions with stakeholders to prioritize and commit to next steps.
- Train teams on storytelling to turn insights into compelling, actionable narratives.
The rise of the strategic insight consultant
These shifts raise an important question: Can traditional analytics and insights functions evolve fast enough to meet the demands of today’s organizations? The answer lies not in more tools or faster reports alone but in reimagining the role of the insights professional.
In the near future, the ability to curate and maintain organizational knowledge may become table stakes. The true differentiator will be the rise of the strategic insight consultant – professionals who go beyond finding insights to activating on them. These professionals will be valued not just for their technical expertise but for their ability to: connect the dots across complex data ecosystems; tell compelling, actionable stories that resonate with decision-makers; and influence, inspire and guide organizations toward bold, confident actions.
The best insights professionals of tomorrow will be those who don’t just answer questions but those who spark progress, shape strategy and have the courage to recommend what to do next.