CEO - David Alterman takes a moment to reflect on Growing the Pie

Richard Huntington, Chief Strategy Office at Saatchi shared an insightful and inspiring article just before Christmas. His premise was a simple one ‘let’s stick together in the new year – as a marketing community…as citizens of one nation and one society’.

This struck a powerful chord. So many human experiences are currently defined in the context of conflict, be it industrial disputes where the only shared perspective is intransigence,  or politics more generally where conflict is almost a matter of principle.

Even dealing with illness is couched in terms of conflict – how often do we hear about battles and fights against cancer and other serious illnesses? In other words using masculine, competitive language in inappropriate contexts.

Is it a surprise that countries with female prime ministers generally coped better with COVID-19? According to a report by Katie Tyner and Farida Jalalzai….

‘consensus-oriented governance, honest and frequent communication with the public, agile and adaptive institutions, deference to scientific advice, collective and decisive action, and policies guided by empathy and humility have proved critical in these cases and that many of these factors are associated with stereotypically feminine leadership traits.

In other words it wasn’t about confrontation or ‘defeating the pandemic’ but about finding a constructive, collaborative and honest solution to the problems they were facing.

What has that got to do with market research you might be asking?

Well I spent six years on the main board of the Market Research Society and one thing struck me above all else – market research remains a relatively small, undervalued industry. If we can grow the relevance and importance of market research to businesses at large everyone in the industry wins.

So let’s focus on the client, do great work, and yes share and collaborate with colleagues and peers, and in the words of our lamented Prime Minister Truss let’s, ‘Grow The Pie’.