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It’s a new day. It’s a new team. And the message is onwards and upwards.
At the last Committee meeting, following the resignation of Rachael Ormrod and Mike Imms, Ann Whalley was elected AQR chair unanimously, as was Fiona Jack vice chair, Liz Sykes honorary secretary and Anne Ward treasurer.
The new team aim to provide a representative and cohesive leadership, given their backgrounds. Whalley has experience of building a small business, Jack of international work, Sykes is managing director of a qualitative recruiment company while Ward is managing director of a firm within a large multinational group.
There are already a number of items on their agenda for the coming year:
- The continued raising of professional standards
- A drive to recruit and retain talented individuals to the industry
- A move to adopt a more global rather than international/national perspective
- The promotion of AQR outside the marketing press
Some of these issues are already being addressed. For instance, the theme of the next Trends Day has been deliberately drawn up to appeal to a wider audience, while the New Researchers Evening in July attracted many non-members. A new global forum is on the cards, following the success of the QRCA/AQR Paris conference.
The soon to be published Recruitment Guidelines, meanwhile, reflect the importance of field and the start of a debate as to whether it needs a body of its own under the auspices of AQR or the MRS .
Its going to be another busy year. You can tell.
Louella Miles
Writers4Management
This article was first published in InBrief magazine, September 2001
Copyright © Association for Qualitative Research, 2001
About the author

Louella Miles
Louella Miles, the editor of In Brief since July 1996, is a business journalist of some 20 years experience, focusing mainly on marketing-related topics. Louella is the co-founder of the professional writing service, Writers 4 Management, and along with her business partner Laura Mazur has written Conversations with Marketing Masters, published by John Wiley in January 2007, and Conversations with Green Gurus in 2009.
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Louella Miles
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