THE RESEARCH INDUSTRY: BAD AND BETTER AT THE SAME TIME

I read a lot of posts from people talk about their jobs, grinding through the chaos of the pandemic, hoping for growth and stability, and so forth. . I also did a bit of reflecting, thinking about my career and how I ended up at YouGov. I thought maybe I'd write some of this down, with the hope that it might actually be useful to people still building their careers and as a thank you to those who helped steer and guide me into a far better person than I otherwise would have been.

I have been a career Researcher. For people that don't like the Research industry, I suppose my career looks like an utter waste of an otherwise good mind. "Steve Jobs didn't believe in market research," they say (not true, but often quoted). Research is slow, not predictive, not an accurate depiction of reality (sometimes true). Modeling-schmodeling and all that jazz. I grappled with hearing this for many years. Earlier in my career, it made me want to change trajectories altogether, but at the end of the day, the year, and six decades (I'm a late '70s baby, so I have lived now in technically six decades), here I still am. My wife jokingly told me the other day she loves when people quote themselves in new year's rants, so as a shoutout to her, I must quote myself.

Instead of always wanting to be somewhere else, I said to myself, "let's follow the words of Hans Rosling and accept that things can be 'Bad and Better at the same time'".And that is essentially how I look at the Research industry--bad and better at the same time. There is still a lot of waste. Many models are as predictive as a coin flip. There is still some fraud. Targeting is not always perfect. Sure, this sounds pretty bad, but if you think about it, Research and Data have never been as good as they are now. Never have we had a better understanding of Consumer Behavior then we do RIGHT NOW. Technology has given us platforms to request and receive feedback quickly. Database integrations allow us to bring it together. Better tools allow us to rapidly find insight in data faster and more clearly than ever before. Machine learning does a lot of the work we had to figure out manually in the past.

BAD AND BETTER AT THE SAME TIME.

And with that thought, I packed my bags and moved to YouGov, my first-ever role in a "supplier-side" company. For those not in the industry, "suppliers" are essentially providers of Market Research and Data that sell to companies (brands, agencies, governments, etc.) that then use this to make decisions. I've always been a customer of research, meticulously carving out annual budgets, year-after-year, trying to find the best of the best in terms of suppliers.

YouGov, a company about 20 years old, has a nice slogan, "What the World Thinks". We look at the world every single day--running surveys, doing analysis on data, and providing insight that hopefully helps organizations align what they do with what is right for everyday people. We have a lot of data and thankfully, a CEO that cares as much about ethics as he does about the bottom line. Ethics and appropriate use of information are consistent themes that flow through the company. It's hard to get this right all the time and in many cases, companies in this industry (like many others) are more interested in their bottom-line than evolving the industry, caring about consumers' privacy, or actually adding value to their customers.

Someone recently told me that they see a growing disconnect between supplier offers and the value they generate for their customers. For my tiny little part of the world, I hope to change that in the years to come (at least at YouGov). My central goal is to bring real value to the people I work with; to express what people want and do it in a way that makes customers delighted, not just satisfied. I want to not just do work; rather MEANINGFUL, VALUE-ADDING work.

One of my other philosophical goals for 2020 and beyond was to "spend more time working with people I love working with". This sounds really silly to some, but we all know the feeling we get when we are surrounded by our favorite colleagues. The ones that inspire us. The ones that challenge us. The ones that make us laugh. The ones that make us think. 2019 was a great year in this respect. The team at Gojek taught me all about working with people you like. I loved working with that company and the people on my team there. Luckily, I have a lot of great people around me at YouGov too. All biases included, we have great people. To some extent, I also get to pursue engagements with some people I know and have worked with in the past, but have lost touch with over the years. I look forward to rekindling relationships again and working together to do meaningful, big things.

I have known a lot of people that have used Research and been disappointed in it in the past. It didn't generate real value for them. If you are one of these people, let's talk. Let the future be a place where we continue to make things better.