The new Southern African Marketing Research Association (SAMRA) council under the guidance of incoming chairman Prof Adre Schreuder was announced at the Annual General Meeting (AGM) hosted by TNS Surveys in Randburg.
Outgoing SAMRA chair Elsa Thirion-Venter reviewed the past year, while Schreuder shed light on the way forward in terms of the association’s focus areas and activities in the coming year.
The council will assume their new portfolios on 1 September 2011 and serve until 31 August 2012:
Name Group Portfolio
Prof Adre Schreuder Director Chair
Jan Wegelin Director Chair
Elect/Treasurer
Elsa Thirion Venter Director Immediate Past Chair
Marna Kirchner Branch Chair Johannesburg Branch
Chair
Juliet van Zyl Branch Chair Cape Branch Chair
Elsa Thirion-Venter Branch Chair Pretoria Branch
Chair
Peter Highley Branch Chair KwaZulu Chair
Liza Burmeister Branch Chair Namibia Chair
Tania Scates Chairman’s Council Fieldworkers Forum
Chair
Grand Lindhorst Chairman’s Council Research Users Forum (RUF)
Chair
Shirley Benney Chairman’s Council SAMRA Corporate
Chair
Elaine Alder Chairman’s Council Professional
Practice Chair
Kobus Badenhorst Chairman’s Council Membership Chair
Anina Maree Chairman’s Council Communications Chair
Salome Barnard Communications Portfolio International Communications
Portfolio Chair
Monique Greenland Communications Portfolio Internal
Communications Portfolio Chair
Schalk van Vuuren Membership Portfolio SAMRA Journal Chair
Kim Larsen Membership Portfolio Conference and
Awards Chair
Mzwandile Khanya Membership Portfolio Membership
Diversity
Cletus Dube Membership Portfolio Yearbook Chair
Alex Kessel Professional Practice Portfolio
Accreditation Chair
Noluvuko Mathibe Professional Practice Portfolio Training and
Education Chair
Leonie Vorster Professional Practice Portfolio Code of
Conduct Chair
Ronelle Colyn Professional Practice Portfolio Consumer
Protection Act
According to a press statement, SAMRA is facing a number of industry-related as well as legislative challenges in the coming year, and will focus on the
following:
• ensuring a well-regulated research industry through maintaining enhanced professional standards, creating increased awareness and providing quality information;
• enhancing the credibility and reputation of all SAMRA members (re-establish the relevance and credibility of professional marketing
research) among existing and new research users;
• positioning SAMRA as credible authority and industry body representing members in regulatory challenges and relevance of the Consumer Protection Act and the anticipated Protection of Private Information Act;
• increasing participation and alignment with relevant industry organisations such as DMASA, ASA and other marketing related bodies;
• diversifying the members’ base of SAMRA through a review of member categories and aggressive marketing efforts among researchers, users, academics and students;
• finalising and member buy-in of the SAMRA 2011 strategic plan;
• implementing and continuous measurement of progress of 2011 strategic plan;
• investigating the introduction of a fulltime secretariat (appointment of CEO) in SAMRA;
• evaluating all functional portfolios in SAMRA and updating the SAMRA structure;
• developing policy and operational guidelines for each portfolio;
• offering a new updated conference format;
• actively canvassing more research users and promoting client attendance at annual conference;
• enhancing the quality of conference papers as a means to draw a wider and more diverse audience of delegates; and
• investigating the further enhancement of the SAMRA researcher accreditation program.
