Osterman Research is a market research and consulting firm delivering insight on cybersecurity, data protection and information governance.

We provide research-led consulting services on cybersecurity, data protection, and information governance to aid decision-makers at end-user organizations. We gather data to build the argument for upcoming decisions and to support new technology adoption/deployment plans.

Our core research-led service for decision-makers at end-user organizations is a commissioned research and benchmarking program.

Commissioned research and benchmarking programs

Decision-makers at end-user organizations frequently want to understand:

  • How other organizations with similar attributes are approaching decisions on cybersecurity, data protection, and information governance. For example, what are other large organizations in the financial services sector doing with public cloud services, or homomorphic encryption, or meeting compliance requirements for supervising communications? Alternatively, how are other medium-sized organizations negotiating the shift from on-premises email security to cloud-based email security?
  • What are the near- and longer-term strategic priorities for decision-makers at other organizations with similar attributes. Insight on the weighting of priorities at other organizations is a helpful comparative indicator when establishing internal priorities.

Market research is our core competency, and just as vendors commission Osterman Research to conduct research on their behalf, so too can decision-makers at end-user organizations. In general, commissioned research and benchmarking programs use the following process and deliverables:

  1. Osterman Research schedules an online meeting with the decision-maker to decide the research objectives and determine the attributes of organizations to target – encompassing respondent role, geography, organization size, and any specific responsibilities held by the respondent.
  2. Osterman Research drafts a custom survey to elicit the information sought by the decision-maker, and works with the decision-maker (and/or nominated representatives) to finalize the wording of each question and response options.
  3. Osterman Research initiates the survey fieldwork, gathering responses from the desired number of respondents in organizations that meet the target attributes. Respondents are drawn from Osterman’s survey panel and panels from third-party survey panel providers, depending on the nature of the program.
  4. After the survey fieldwork is completed, Osterman Research will prepare a research report that includes the results of the research and our analysis of it to support the decision-maker. This research is for the exclusive use of the decision-maker commissioning the research. The research data can also be presented to various groups within the organization using online or in-person formats.

Contact Osterman Research to learn more

Please contact us for more information about our consulting services for end-user organizations.