What she's done Nicole has eight years of experience as a qualitative researcher, conducting consumer and business-to-business research projects, both domestically and internationally and along all stages of brand and advertising development. She has worked with a broad range of industries, including healthcare and pharmaceuticals, logistics and supply chain management, information technology, and a variety of consumer goods and services. She is skilled at conducting focus groups, in-depth interviews, in-home ethnographies, and shop-a-longs. From 2000–2002, Nicole was a senior account executive at Hall & Partners, where she managed and designed branding, marketing, and advertising research projects for clients including Microsoft, UPS, and Schering-Plough. An insightful and engaging writer, Nicole has a master's degree in journalism and has both editorial and marketing experience in the publishing industry, including positions at Publishers Weekly, Zoetrope: All-Story, and Oxford University Press. Why research? Nicole loves the mix of roles she plays as a qualitative researcher. The performer in her comes alive when she leads focus groups, while at the same time, as an active listener, she picks up on what respondents are saying, both explicitly and implicitly. As an interviewer, she asks the right questions, and she plays the parts of anthropologist and psychologist when making keen observations to intuit what makes respondents tick. Once fieldwork is complete, Nicole becomes a storyteller—to craft the narrative of the report—and an analyst—to help companies make smart strategic decisions. Most memorable projects (in her own words): Luxury cars: I did a project on product design for a luxury car company. I interviewed people while we walked around and got in and out of the prototype for a new car. It was fascinating to explore how certain automotive design elements suggested personality characteristics of the car, and by extension, of the driver. Dream vacations: I worked for a cruise line, leading on-board focus groups with consumers about their most memorable vacations. Vacations turn out to be a fascinating window into people's hopes and dreams, and I loved looking into this emotional territory, learning what people really care about and long for in their lives. Education B.A., English with concentration in Anthropology, |
