Coming Home

I've been involved in and around market research from a young age, when my Mum was a recruiter and we used to hold focus groups in our lounge at home! During secondary school and A-Levels I’d help out with participant recruitment or hosting in our Viewing Facility, Aspect, and after studying Psychology at University, I decided that I wanted to forge a career in the research industry and joined Acumen as a Fieldwork Manager. At the time Acumen was in it’s infancy, headed up by Abi, I became its second employee and I’ll never forget the thrill of winning new clients and the utter delight to hear fieldwork had gone well.

Having note-taken for many researchers over the years and being a naturally inquisitive person, I decided that I wanted to see what life as a Researcher was like, so I moved to London where I worked for a number of agencies (Research International / TNS, now Kantar, Spring Research, now Material and Razor Research), initially starting in Quant research, before moving to Qual and becoming a Research Director, as well as a Board Member of the Association of Qualitative Research (AQR) taking responsibility for skills and training of those newer to the industry.

After around 8 years in London, I decided to move back North and re-join the family businesses, setting up Full Colour Research and supporting Acumen clients who needed additional resource with moderation and reporting on projects. Alongside my work as a Researcher, over the past couple of years I’ve had an increasingly active role in Acumen so am delighted to now be officially returning to the fold as Chief Operating Officer, working alongside Abi to ensure that whilst Acumen have grown in size, we remain true to the values that were instilled all those years ago. I’m excited to work with the teams on training, understanding the impact of great participants on the overall project and offering my perspective as a researcher into how project managers and recruiters can best support, add value and make our lives easier. I’m excited to innovate and work with the team to ensure our systems and processes set up apart from our competitors and allow us to show the agility and forward-thinking nature that the research world needs. With Acumen offering Qual, Quant, Healthcare, Social, B2B and International research, I’m excited to use the skills I’ve acquired in my career to date to help Acumen deliver the best possible service to clients and I have realised that I still get that same thrill from winning a new client and hearing how well fieldwork has gone as I did all those years ago.

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