The Need for Speed: How B2B Thought Leadership Can Keep Pace with the Market

Cheryl Dickison - SVP Sales & Client Success

The pace of business has accelerated dramatically, creating a challenge familiar to every B2B thought leadership team: by the time a traditional research study is designed, fielded, analyzed, approved, and published, the market conversation may have already moved on.

This challenge was at the heart of GTLI's recent webinar, The Need for Speed: How to Make Thought Leadership More Agile , featuring René Stranghoner, Head of Thought Leadership Research at ServiceNow and David Gentle, Head of Strategic Marketing Programs at Fujitsu.

Audience polling reinforced just how widespread the challenge has become. The top driver behind the need for faster thought leadership was keeping pace with market and industry changes, confirming that marketing leaders are increasingly being asked to respond to rapidly evolving conversations with credible, evidence-based perspectives.

Business Drivers & Internal Challenges

While market shifts and breaking developments are creating pressure to move faster, both panelists emphasized that internal realities often pose the biggest challenge. Stranghoner explained that ServiceNow's move toward more agile research was not driven by a desire to produce more content, but by a mission to augment flagship research to surface 'credible and timely insights quickly' and expand the range of business topics the company could address.

Gentle noted that stakeholder alignment remains a critical hurdle, particularly in organizations where accuracy and credibility are paramount. Traditional research programs can take up to 12 months from concept to publication, making it difficult to stay aligned with rapidly evolving market conversations.

A second audience poll echoed those concerns. Respondents cited stakeholder alignment, internal reviews and approvals, and research process complexity among the biggest obstacles to moving faster.

Methodology & Operating Models

One of the webinar's clearest takeaways was that there is no single model for rapid research. An initiative adopted by Fujitsu saw them pilot a six-week research cycle built around a smaller sample, just five survey questions, and tightly managed stakeholder reviews. Surprisingly, Gentle found that the constraints improved focus.

'Having five questions was quite helpful in terms of us being able to filter out what was important,' he explained. The compressed timelines also created accountability, and a sense of immediacy, with stakeholders understanding they had days, not weeks, to provide feedback.

ServiceNow took a different approach, creating a global community of 100 C-suite executives who participate in short surveys every eight to ten weeks. According to Stranghoner, the Executive Signals program provides a continuous stream of directional insights that can be quickly applied to emerging business topics. The program complements large, longitudinal studies, creating a research mix capable of delivering both deep analysis and timely market perspective.

Outcomes, Organizational Value & Enablement

Both panelists agreed that speed only matters if it enables better business outcomes.

For Fujitsu, rapid research allowed the team to capture executive sentiment around quantum computing and turn those findings into timely announcements, campaigns, and supporting content while the topic was still gaining momentum.

For ServiceNow, the focus is on extending the life and utility of every research investment. Stranghoner described a robust enablement model that includes event kits, executive presentations, regional data sheets, and interactive dashboards that allow teams to access relevant insights by geography, industry, or audience. The goal is to ensure research continues fueling customer conversations long after publication and delivers stronger return on both time and budget invested.

Lessons Learned, AI & The Future

Looking ahead, both leaders see AI as an important accelerator, but not a replacement for human expertise.

Gentle shared that AI has helped improve content localization, idea generation, and translation workflows, while Stranghoner called AI a 'fantastic companion' for ideation, analytics, fact-checking, and research quality assurance.

Perhaps the most memorable perspective came from Stranghoner's observation that 'the only mistake you can make with AI, in my opinion, is not using it.' However, both panelists cautioned against overreliance on AI-generated outputs. Organizations must be able to stand behind every conclusion they publish, making human judgment, governance, and quality control essential parts of the process.

The future of thought leadership is not simply faster research. It is building an always-on capability that delivers credible, timely insights when the market needs them and provides the evidence organizations need to speak with greater authority. The brands that will lead tomorrow's conversations are those that continuously generate relevant insights today, transforming proprietary research into proof points that elevate their voice, strengthen their credibility, and shape the conversations that matter most.