MRS Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Council

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Ex-Chair Babita Earle introduces the council and its aims

Our mission

To strive to be an industry that truly represents the world we seek to understand

To be an authentic and impactful voice. Leading, helping and guiding our industry on issues of representation, equality and accountability.

Our commitments are:

1) To advise MRS policy for diversity and inclusion with clear messaging for members, Company Partners and the wider sector about how we will work towards positive change together.

2) To lead a focussed set of initiatives that will aim to attract diverse new talent to the sector and achieve better representation throughout the industry.

3) To drive and encourage change through celebrating, recognising and rewarding the progress of those who raise awareness and understanding of culturally and socially diverse, marginalised or minority communities. Have a mechanism to measure progress and change across the industry

The EDI Council will achieve its aims and help the sector better reflect the real world we live in through a mixture of governance (accountable targets) and groundswell (inclusive and influential actions). For more details contact info@mrs.org.uk.

Read the ED&I Council’s full Statement of Purpose.
Josephine is a Fellow of the Market Research Society and has spent most of her career focused on understanding Gen Z.

As part of the senior team at Savanta she leads it’s Next Gen practice. She was the Managing Director of YouthSight research until it was acquired and before that she spent nearly a decade at GfK.

Josephine is an active member of MRSpride, presenting the podcast OUTsights, and is passionate about making market research an industry where everyone can succeed.
Josephine is a regular on the international conference circuit, sharing her take on generational theory supported by Savanta’s unique State of the Youth Nation tracking data.

Rebecca Cole is Managing Director of Cobalt Sky, an award-winning market research operations company specialising in online data collection and data processing. She joined Cobalt Sky as a graduate in 2006 and is a highly experienced web scripter and quantum programmer. As well as being on the main board of the MRS, Rebecca chairs the MRS Representation in Research steering group and has spent over 10 years on the board of the Association for Survey Computing (ASC) which she now co-chairs.

Sam is the Head of Digital Analytics at Kantar UK. Previous to this he was CEO of Lifestream and Head of Client Strategy at Streetbees. His passion for the last several years has been on finding value and commercialising new data sources, as well as developing emerging talent in the industry.

Jane is responsible for the leadership of MRS. Jane was previously at HM Revenue & Customs where she developed and led the individual customer function and the behavioural evidence and insight unit.
Before moving to HMRC in 2006, she held senior roles in both public and private sector organisations including Shell, Unilever, the Department of Constitutional Affairs and the BBC, where she was responsible for the iconic 'Perfect Day' campaign which, as well as winning advertisement of the year, raised £2.5m for Children in Need.
Sinead is the Owner & Founder of Hasson Associates Recruitment who specialise in recruitment for the market research sector, she has recruited for the market research industry since 1996 and founded Hasson Associates in 2008. Passionate about equality in the workplace she is a strong advocate of creating work environments where people are fully supported, where they can bring their whole selves to work and thrive. She is passionate about career management and encourages people to regularly check that they are working in a place which support their values. A member of the MRS D&I&E Council and WiRe Exec she has mentored young researchers and takes every opportunity to promote better working environments for her clients.

Steven Lacey is a researcher with over 20 years’ experience. His particular specialism is researching the ‘mass mainstream’, the often-White British working class that are so often ignored in traditional research. He has a huge body of work in this area, looking at issues such as the reasons for the white working class voting for Brexit, far-right extremism and the recent Conservative general election victory. More broadly Steven has a wealth of experience in research among so-called ‘hard-to-reach audiences.’ Steven is disabled and from a working class background – during his career he has faced a number of barriers, the inspiration for him setting up The Outsiders, an agency that brings marginalised voices to the table. In 2016 he was recognised with a Ginny Valentine Badge of Courage Award for “the pursuit of minority voices.”

Daniel is Commercial Director at Yonder Data Solutions who are a trusted fieldwork and data collection company and is an active member of the steering committee for MRS CORe who are a hub for all things concerning ethnic diversity with the industry. Daniel has over 18 years of experience in the research industry internationally having worked in cities such as Sydney, Beijing and back home here in London. The majority of Daniel’s career has been on the operational/panel/project management side and commercial side of businesses focussed on managing teams and delivering research to all sectors. Having lived and worked in different countries and cultures, Daniel is a strong advocate for equality, diversity and inclusion.

Danielle is a quantitative insight specialist, with a wealth of experience and expertise advising global brands spanning technology and media, utilities, FMCG and finance.

Prior to the Forge, Danielle was Head of Client Strategy at Relish, where she specialised in addressing strategic challenges, unlocking new growth verticals and commercially focused consultancy. Her strengths lie in communicating simple stories from complex data that inspire action.

Danielle is passionate about elevating our industry; being the Women in Research (WIRe) London lead, WIRe Advisory Board member, MRS Diversity, Inclusion and Equality lead and is often seen presenting, Chairing or judging at IIEX, ESOMAR or MRS conferences.

Danielle holds an MA in Geography, and an MSc in Environment, Society and Culture, both from the University of Edinburgh. Danielle also enjoys exploring wine, dystopian fiction and CrossFit, but usually not at the same time.

Sabrina Trinquetel (she/her) heads up UK sales at Measure Protocol, who provide the fastest access to unique behavioural data.

Over the past 10 years she's been instrumental in driving growth of new offers, including communities, strategic loyalty insights, and behavioural data.

Passionate about driving more inclusive, ethical and accurate research she is part of the MRS Pride steering committee, and uses the platform to amplify minority voices, build empathy and celebrate stores to enable industry wide change.

Sabrina has a strong desire to accelerate EDI across the industry and showcase its commercial benefits and consults with MR agencies to develop their EDI strategies in line with the CEO Inclusion Pledge.

Georgie White is Chief Customer Officer at Holland & Barrett, Non executive director of the MRS Board, Chair of the MRS Senior Client Council, and a member of the MRS Diversity, Equality & Inclusion Council. With a focus on empowering teams to be brilliant business partners driving action, Georgie is an experienced insight leader having established fantastic, award winning teams at diverse brands such as BT/EE, British Gas, Hive, Capital One & Merrill Lynch in roles covering Insight, Data and Commercial within both B2C and B2B environments in the UK and Globally. Georgie is a passionate advocate for D&I overall, including championing more women into careers at all levels in data/insight, supporting neurodiversity and diversibility, and driving for better representation and inclusion within the Insight industry and the workplace more widely. Georgie is proud of her superpowers from being Neurodiverse, something it took her close to 40 years to reconcile – what a wasted time and effort it was before she realised what a superpower it is!

 

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