Peter Van Brunt addresses a colleague who feels that MR just “isn’t fun anymore.”

His colleague’s frustrations:

1. Too much email communication rather than face to face.
2. Increased speed of communication and deadline expectations.
3. Non-traditional competition from “non-researchers purporting to do or know how to do MR”.

The first is a general societal frustration.

I’ll address the 2nd and 3rd.

Speed:
Like it or not, expectations for more rapid turnaround time are growing. This is simply a function of the business environment and will only increase. But, I sense that there are somewhat different time expectations for work that is tactical (and in which the MR team is brought in late, usually for cover) and work that is of a more strategic nature. In my experience, the more strategic the work, the greater the understanding that time to contemplate is needed. Garbage in, garbage out. This is an advantage that the consulting community (McKinsey, BCG) have over traditional market research players. They may wind up using the same research tools, but they are brought in at a higher level and have the luxury of a greater time horizon for project completion.

I also strongly believe that one future of MR is the globally distributed research team. These teams will be able to leverage the 24 hour global clock in ways that could dramatically accelerate our delivery times. Right now most MR is regionally based with some offshoring of functions. The real change will come when the analytical and strategic teams are globally distributed.

Non Traditional Competition:
Get ready. Most of the non-traditional competitors will be in qualitative methods like communities, etc.