Adrian Chedore, the newly-appointed worldwide chief executive
officer of Aegis Research, has moved swiftly to reshape what is now an
informal collection of separate research houses into a global
organisation sharing a common strategic direction.
Aegis Research - part of Aegis Group, which also operates independent
media agency Carat - has existed for less than three years. It has grown
through mergers and acquisitions and now boasts leading research
companies, including Market Facts in the United States, Pegram Walters
in Britain, MEMRB in Central and Eastern Europe, the Middle East and
Africa, Demoscopie in France and Asia Market Intelligence (AMI) in
Asia-Pacific.
The task Chedore now faces since taking up the role in September is to
unify the group's far-flung empire. In part, that means establishing new
operations in Japan, Australia and Western Europe.
The more important strategy, however, is "to pull everything together so
that globally we have a single identity, culture, vision, objectives and
product and service offering", says Chedore, who is also the chief
executive and co-founder of AMI, which Aegis acquired in March last
year.
"We have 2,500 employees in 74 offices in 38 countries. A multitude of
different cultures and heritages, therefore, exist. But we have to bring
them together as a cohesive whole, so that they share a common vision as
well as common systems and processes," he says.
This means selling a common package of the best products and services
the group has at its disposal. It also means training staff and hiring
people from a variety of different industries to more effectively meet
the needs of clients.
The latter point is uppermost in Chedore's mind. "We want to be able to
speak the client's language; not simply sell the products we happen to
have. We can't sell what we are offering like a packet of
cornflakes.
We must tailor it to meet clients' needs," says Chedore, who launched
AMI in 1991 with eight people.
Clients demanding actionable advice as well as data and trends have been
the key driver behind the redefinition of Aegis Research.
But in response to growing demand by media agencies for a single source
media consumption survey in Asia offering more in-depth questioning of
respondents for psychographic analyses, Chedore counters: "The arguments
are too simplistic. You could find that a yuppie group drinks
Carlsberg.
Then you find that an older group also drinks Carlberg. The question
they are asking is akin to asking how long a piece of string is.
"What research needs to do is not prejudge ways of segmenting people but
to build surveys that are useful and which do not exhaust the
respondents in the survey process."
The reshaping of the group includes renaming and rebranding the company
because the 'Aegis Research' name has already been taken in the US. The
image makeover is expected to take place next year, which should go some
way in strengthening Chedore's chances of turning his vision into
reality.
However, he says there are no deadlines. He likens the progress towards
these goals as part of the company's natural evolution. "The work will
never be done because we will always continue to add new geography,
services and tools. It's dangerous to set anything in concrete these
days."
