In early July Ray Poynter interviewed Peter Harris, the Director of Corporate Services at Colmar Brunton Australia’s largest independent ad hoc research agency, about the issues facing the Australian research market. Peter’s role at Colmar Brunton was created to enable the company to focus more on overall strategic development, which puts him in an ideal position to cast his view over the industry.
Colmar Brunton was formed in 1989 and has grown to a company with 150 consultants, 600 casual/part-time staff, and offices in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Canberra, Perth, Adelaide, and Singapore. Peter identifies the key to the Colmar Brunton culture as being its positive relationship with its own people and points towards the way that Colmar Brunton are employee owned – meaning that they are not looking over their shoulders when making decisions and recommendations.
As well as Peter’s role with Colmar Brunton, he is the Vice-President of the AMSRS (Australian Market & Social Research Society) and has particular responsibility for the AMSRS’s Future Trends Sub-committee. The sub-committee has a triple mission:
1. Assess future trends in technology and information to ensure the AMSRS is the pinnacle body of market and social research and measurement in Australia.
2. Ensure the AMSRS is ahead of potential new competitors who could disrupt the role of market research within Australian business.
3. Keep the AMSRS in line with developments currently underway globally within major industry bodies such as ESOMAR, MRS and others.
Although Peter is keen to keep abreast of global changes and initiatives, in order to respond to them, he is also keen to make people aware of the fact that there are areas where Australia already leads the world and where its proper role is as a leader. Peter cites the example of gambling, as an area where the Australian market is more developed than others, and where market research is addressing issues that have yet to be discussed in other markets. Earlier this year Peter presented a paper to the International Conference on Gambling & Risk Taking (May 2006, Nevada, US), urging that more markets learn from the Australian experience and move from a commodity to a brand approach.
Anybody wanting to hear more about Peter’s views about the future of gambling and risk taking research, both within Australia and globally can contact him at peter.harris@cbr.com.au.
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