Bigger Decisions, Tighter Budgets: Why 2026 Needs a Learning Plan

During a time of persistent uncertainty, how do you build confidence in your decisions?

As we head into 2026, every brand I speak with is challenged with two realities:

Challenge #1: Navigating Unprecedented Market Complexity

• Prices are volatile

• Margins are tighter

• Competition is fiercer

• Channels are multiplying

• AI and emerging tech is constantly disrupting

• Consumer behavior is shifting faster than teams can keep up

Challenge #2: Doing More with Less

• Marketing budgets are down from 13.8% of revenue (Sep 2022) to 7.7% (Fall 2024).(CMO Survey), yet 73% of CMOs say they’re expected to “do more with less.”(WSJ)

• R&D spending faces similar pressure as companies balance innovation needs against cost constraints

• 68% of marketers say they’re focused more on the present than the future. (Deloitte)

Of course, all 2026 goals expect growth – Sales, Share, Productivity, ROI. So how do you plan growth amid continued complexity and tighter budgets? You can't afford gut instinct or trial-and-error.

You need precision — in both your decisions and how you inform them.

That means having the right insights at the right time, answering questions that truly drive your business. Not more data but better, sharper learning. Because the cost of getting it wrong isn't a missed opportunity, it can be $ millions in irreversible damage.

Having successfully led insight agendas at Samsung, Unilever, and Nielsen — and now through Khatanalytics — I help CPG and CE brands build consumer learning that delivers real business ROI.

It starts with a strong learning plan — prioritized, actionable, fully aligned to business goals.

Contents:

In this blog, we will review:

• What is a Learning Plan?  ▶

• Business leaders 2026 learning priorities ▶

• What you gain with the right learning plans ▶

• Khatanalytics' 8-step framework (with free template to develop yourself) ▶

• Internal roadblocks to manage for ▶

• How we can help you develop a plan that gets funded  ▶

What is a Learning Plan? 

A Learning Plan isn’t just another research document. It's a strategic learning roadmap that transforms how you make decisions:

1. Starts with your critical goals and challenges 

2. Pinpoints the questions vital to your decision making

3. Matches questions to fit-for-purpose research within your budget

4. Secures resources and budget before the annual planning window closes

Teams that invest in precise learning today will make smarter decisions tomorrow. They’ll protect margins, reduce risk, and outperform — especially in a tough market.

Remember, the real question isn't:  “Can we afford to invest in developing insights? ”It’s: “What’s the cost if we don’t?”

What Khatanalytics’ Clients Are Prioritizing for 2026

Before we dive into how to build learning plans, let me share what's keeping leaders like you up at night. In a recent client pulse check, we asked senior leaders across CPG and CE about their insight and capability priorities for 2026.

Here’s what they told us:

Top insight areas to support strategy building:

• Measuring Pricing & Promotional Elasticity Under Tariff / Inflation Pressure

• Identifying Opportunities to Build a Differentiated, High Equity Brand

• Mapping the Consumer Journey to Optimize Critical Touchpoints and Grow Loyalty

• Evaluating Product Portfolio for Margin Resilience & Consumer Relevance

• Tracking Consumer & Shopper Perspectives Amid Market Volatility

• Understanding Consumer & Shopper Segments more Deeply

These identify where to focus learning investments to empower critical decisions with evidence. Each involves high-stakes questions that can't be answered with stale data.

But it's not just about what to learn — it also requires building organizational muscle:

Most important insight capability areas to drive organizational growth:

• Building compelling retailer-facing strategies / sell in stories, using insights

• Determining which learning areas to invest in to achieve goals

• Elevating team skills in using insights / analytics

I’ll dive into each insight area in future blogs but want to encourage you to consider these for your own 2026 learning agenda too.

What You Gain with the Right Learning Plan

Companies with strategic learning plans don't just gather better data — they make better, high impact decisions.

Bain research finds CPG firms deploying insight‑driven strategies generate +3–5 % points of incremental sales and +200–300 basis points in gross margin.

And the benefits are organization wide:

• Speed to Market: Insights are ready when decisions need to be made — not 8 weeks after the opportunity passed.

• Risk Mitigation: Structured learning helps identify blind spots before they become costly.

  • 53% of consumers say they will cut spend after a bad customer experience (Qualtrics)

• Cross-Functional Alignment: When teams share a learning framework, they make more integrated, faster and confident choices.

• Budget Optimization: No redundant studies. Each builds on the last.

• Competitive Intelligence: Learning plans help you predict, not just react.

  • Companies improving CX are 2.5× more likely to gain market share (Kantar)

The difference isn't just operational, it's strategic.

Companies with robust learning plans don't just respond to consumer changes; they anticipate and shape them.

Without a Learning Plan: 

• Decisions wait on research timelines

• Budget requests get declined

• Teams work in silos

• Opportunities are missed

With a Strategic Learning Plan:

• Intelligence ready when decisions arise

• Budget secured upfront with clear ROI

• Integrated cross-functional understanding

• Motivated CMI teams work on strategic projects not fire-drills

Success In Action: Real Results from a Learning Plan

"Khatanalytics provided our organization with tremendous value in a business planning project. Uzma took time to really understand our needs and how they were and were not being met. She developed a learning framework to organize our information and guide planning...then defined a process and structure for continuous learning to identify new insights for our growth strategies. Uzma's new ideas and actionable recommendations have elevated our intelligence gathering and output." - VP Marketing, Specialty Hair & Skin Care Brand

Managing for Internal Roadblocks

The value is clear. The proof is real. So, what stops companies from building great plans?

Several internal challenges can derail the best intentions and must be actively managed:

• Limited CMI Resources: Small teams are stretched; junior members often lack the strategic skills to architect strong learning agendas. They need to be supported.

• Budget Pressure Paradox: Smaller budgets demand smarter approaches, but without proper planning, you end up with tactical studies that don’t drive strategic decisions.

• Cross-Functional Misalignment: Different departments commission overlapping projects, wasting dollars and creating information silos instead of an integrated consumer understanding.

• Business Capacity Constraints: Even when insights are delivered, there’s often no accountability to drive usage. You risk investing resources in learning that sits on a shelf.

• Speed vs. Depth Tensions: The pressure for quick answers as they arise leads to surface-level insights that don't provide the depth needed for strategic differentiation.

• Ad-Hoc Addiction: Without a plan, each business question becomes a new scramble — creating stress-driving reactive patterns instead of proactive consumer intelligence. Costs for these add up quickly, in both $ and time spent.

I've experienced each of these firsthand from both sides of the table. As a corporate VP and now as a consultant, I know what derails good intentions and what drives real change.

They aren't insurmountable but require a fundamentally different approach to how we think about designing and delivering critical learning. This is where learning plans become invaluable.

How to Develop a Strong Learning Plan

Learning Plans do not have to be complicated. But doing them well requires thoughtful rigor and strong partnership between Insights teams and cross-functional business leaders.

A comprehensive, cross-functional plan typically takes about 4 weeks to develop — can be shortened with experienced guidance and team focus.

Here is the approach I've used with success.

Khatanalytics’ 8-Step Learning Plan Framework:

Area	What to Focus On	Hypothetical Example	Led by	Timeline
1. Priority Goals	Clear targets for business achievement	Grow eCommerce sales by 10%	Business leaders	Week 1
2. Critical Decisions	How are you planning to achieve the goals? What decisions need to be made?	Do we prioritize D2C or retailer.com for investment?	Business leaders	Week 1
3. Prioritized Questions	Determine specific and actionable questions to answer via research. (This is often the most challenging step)	Where and how do category shoppers buy? What drives retailer choice?	Full team, led by CMI	Week 2
4. Usage & Accountability	Identify stakeholders who will use the learning and how it will get actioned	Sales/eComm Lead – to use to build strategy and sell into customers	Full team, led by business leaders	Week 2
5. Research Approaches	List out the various ways to answer each question, with estimated investments	Syndicated Panel data ($X); or Shopper Path to Purchase Study ($X)	CMI led; $ investment approval by business	Week 3
6. Inventory of existing learning	Audit what you already have to identify gaps to invest in	Review past 2 years of research for relevant consumer insights	CMI led	Week 3
7. Timing Alignment	Note timing needs to do the work, aligned to when needed and define what's realistic	8 weeks for new study, deliver before 2026 customer planning meetings	Full team	Week 3
8. Budget Approval	Prioritizing work to be done within budget constraints	Final prioritization and resource allocation	Full team	Week 4

If you would like to use my framework to build your own Learning Plan, you are welcome to download my free template. Both formats include instructions:

Excel with Template to fill or PDF to review

Key Principles for Success

Your learning plan should read like a strategic roadmap, not a research catalog. 

• Each study must connect to specific business decisions with clear timelines.

• Critically, questions must be designed to drive action, not just understanding.

• When business leaders can tie insights directly to revenue impact, budget conversations become much easier. (It's hard for them to say no to something they know will help them. I've done this firsthand!)

Ask the Right Questions

• The difference between average vs exceptional learning often comes down to the questions you ask (which is what makes this the hardest part of the process).

  • Poor research starts with: "What do consumers think about our product?"

  • Great research starts with: "What job are consumers really hiring our category to do, and how is that job evolving?"

    
    

• Strategic questioning requires understanding not just what consumers do, but why they do it, and what would change their behavior.

• They must be very focused on goal-driving results and actionable.

For more on developing strategic questions, check out my blog:

In an Era of Instant Answers — Great CXOs Must Compete on Questions

Let’s Make 2026 a Year of Smarter Decisions

Too often, research is reactive. And by the time you realize you need insights, you're well into the year and you don’t have funding.

Learning plans flip that equation, helping brands proactively ask better questions, more cost efficiently, sooner. They use data more effectively and build internal alignment across teams.

Are You Ready to Build Your 2026 Learning Plan?

• Download my complimentary Learning-Plan Template (Excel) to build your own plan. The structured framework walks you through all 8 steps with examples and guidance

• Book a 30-minute consultation (no obligation) to discuss your 2026 priorities and see if it makes sense for me to help you develop your plan. (Schedule your consultation here)

  • Having successfully built learning frameworks at Samsung, Unilever, and Nielsen, I can help you efficiently align stakeholders, translate business goals into the right questions, and recommend the most effective research methodologies within your budget — ensuring you get maximum insight value from every dollar

• The budget window is closing. Don't let 2026 planning happen without securing what you need to make smarter decisions all year.

Learning isn't a luxury. It's your most valuable investment.

 Companies that will thrive in 2026 aren't necessarily those with the biggest budgets, they're the ones with the smartest learning strategies.

Let’s make 2026 the year insights become your competitive edge!

Let's discuss how we can help

Khatanalytics Consulting specializes in Consumer Experience Journey research and strategy, helping mid-to-large CPG and Consumer Electronics companies build sustainable competitive advantages through strategic consumer intelligence. With executive leadership experience at Samsung, Unilever, and Nielsen, we understand both the insights that drive growth and the practical realities of building them with optimized resources.