Leaning in to Key Initiatives to Move QRCA Forward
It has been an eventful summer at QRCA. After 18 years with our association management company, Ewald Consulting, we have elected for a change and will be moving to a different association management company this fall. Our incoming president, Jeff Hecker, led a comprehensive search and proposal process along with the members of our Governance Management and Oversight Committee (Chris Kann, Abby Leafe, Tom Rich, and Jay Zaltzman) between Ewald and multiple management companies. It was a difficult decision; multiple companies seemed capable of stewarding our association’s future, but out of the four companies we interviewed, Association Acumen impressed us the most with their ideas and professionalism. We look forward to a long relationship with the Association Acumen team. We want to thank Ewald Consulting for nearly two decades of support and work for QRCA.
My mandate for my term as board president was to begin delivering a new website to the QRCA and focus on refining the programs we already had in place rather than delivering anything new. We revamped our sponsorship sales process, redesigned our new member onboarding process, strengthened our partnership with Quirk’s by partnering with them on the Market Research Excellence Award for Qualitative, and with a huge thank you to our board treasurer, Lisa Horwich, we found ways to make much-needed improvements in our accounting processes. It hasn’t been easy; we had to find new means of support for beloved programs—the Young Professionals Grant, the Global Qualitative Award, and even this VIEWS magazine— but the struggles were overdue, and we are finding our way forward and will emerge stronger than before.
As my term as president ends this fall, serving as president certainly has had many adventures and challenges, but I thoroughly enjoyed working with this board. I could not have done anything without them; they gave me all the support and confidence I needed to navigate at every turn, and they could always be counted on to drive programs forward. I end my time at the apex of QRCA leadership, confident in the future of this organization. We have laid the foundation for brighter days, which are close at hand.
You may likely be called on one day to run for election and serve on the board or be nominated for committees. Don’t turn away when that happens. A committee of your peers will come to you because your skills and dedication to the organization are needed. It is an honor to be regarded so well by your fellow researchers. It is a privilege to serve this community and guide its future. Carefully consider the opportunity and answer the call when you are needed.
I look forward to seeing you all in Philadelphia at the 2025 QRCA Annual Conference in February. I’m sure many of you are like me and have already bought your tickets!
Sincerely,
Lauren Isaacson
