Insight hits its stride
Last year saw a sea change in how organisations use data and research to help understand evolving markets and individual consumer needs. Because of this, the Insights profession grew by 15% (ESOMAR 2022) and is expected to exceed this by an additional 5.2% in 2023.
A major concern for businesses is the shortage of talent, largely impacted by the uncertainties facing the UK now. The cost-of-living crisis is something we’re all too familiar with, but it’s becoming a major factor in making candidates more cautious when approached about new opportunities.
ENI was right in the thick of it, ready to support and service our partners, by looking at new pools of talent and fine tuning our inclusive hiring processes. Continuing our program of university sessions, we plan on rolling this out to schools and further education in 2023.
In addition, Liz Norman partnered with Inclusive Environments and Edwin COE, producing a series of webinars tackling neurodiversity in the workplace and working with organisations to better support employees.
Continued work on our inclusive hiring processes led to increased investment in Diversity, Equity & Inclusion training. This, in turn, resulted in record-breaking placements last year, of which 63% were women. We have partnered with many leaders in the space: Jennie Child, Diversely.io and Includability.
Other achievements followed, such as becoming a certified supplier to the Crown Commercial Services (CCS) this year. This means we can create even more exciting career opportunities in 2023 for public sector specialists. This strategy delivered great results for us in the last 12 months.
As the profession continues to suffer from a shortage of talent overall, we can report that certain sectors of insight are growing rapidly. MarTech and Data Analytics are just two examples. We are seeing fewer qualitative researchers conducting face-to-face moderating, and instead greater focus on the analysis of unstructured data. This will, in turn, grow the pool of candidates. They will come from a range of backgrounds and offer new skills, creating opportunities across varied sectors.
International recruitment has been very successful. We moved 12 people from the UK to Australia, creating several communities, and found local candidates in Germany, the Netherlands, the US, and Singapore. This is another area we expect to expand next year.
In summary, although the profession might still be considered ‘talent short’, we certainly haven’t let that hamper development. ENI has found new and innovative ways to widen talent pools, support candidates who might otherwise get overlooked, while still providing top talent to our partners.
The coming year will present challenges as the insight industry continues to experience exponential growth, but we are confident that we can work together with our partners to achieve their maximum potential.