Esomar Council Nominee - why now

I first joined ESOMAR as “new-to-research-industry” in 2002. I was the second employee of Start-up in Tokyo. We were challenging the status quo through the introduction and inclusion of “new tech” to the traditional survey world. While most were talking about moving from Door-to-door to CATI or CAPI… we had moved on to talking about and DOING “wireless surveys”. We had chosen ESOMAR as the leading research professional organisation as the place to “announce” that things were going to change.

It was my first experience of connecting with professionals, clients and agencies (maybe even competitors) and I found it invaluable. As a new researcher I was soaking up every opportuniy that the ESOMAR team had arranged at the APAC conference - workshops, papers and presentations, networking sessions, and also guidelines on privacy and data. I could see the immediate value and I was “hooked”. As a start-up I could see the value, and through my career as I moved from agency to client that value continued to be real - it provided my teams with ways to explore new tools, connect with other clients that were “going through the same thing” - to talk about what we needed more of and less of, to LISTEN to agencies on what they needed more of and less of.

In 2002 when I presented in Singapore on behalf of the team at JMI, we were convinced that the way we do research was at a turning point. And the industry needed to think what and how we would react to this. With Covid19 accelerating transition and neccesitating change, we are again at that turning point. I am convinced that ESOMAR will again drive progress and forward momentum to lead as it has done before. I decided that as way to give back I will raise my hand to be part of ESOMAR COUNCIL. Would be humbled to serve the industry and ESOMAR team that has given me so much over the years.