Minutes of the ASC Annual General Meeting

Held at Southampton University
Thursday 13th September 2007

1.          Apologies for Absence

Ed Ross, Hugh Gentleman, Mick Couper, Garj Basi.

 2.          Minutes of last Annual General Meeting (Friday 29^th September 2006)

 The Minutes were agreed.

 3.          Matters Arising

 There were no matters arising.

 4.          Report from the Chairman of the Executive Committee – Laurance Gerrard

The organisation of this conference has taken most of the Executive Committee’s efforts this year. Such an undertaking is no mean feat and the Chairman thanked the committee members and everyone else involved for their effective work. All are volunteers. When Mike Trotman, the Chairman of the Scientific Programme Committee was asked whether he would do it again, he said “yes”.

The Chairman reported that the series of evening meetings held jointly with the Market Research Society have been very successful and oversubscribed. They will be continued and the next one will be in November. Details will appear on the website shortly. ASC links with the MRS continue to remain strong.

The Chairman stated that the next one day conference will be held at Imperial College in London in April next year. Again, details will be available on the ASC website soon.

The Technology Effectiveness Award organised in association with the Market Research Society is in its fourth year and the shortlisted entries will be announced towards the end of this meeting.

The ASC continues to support Triple-S, the independent group that provides the survey data interchange standard.

Moving forward, the ASC will continue to seek ways of providing for its members and the Chairman urged all to keep abreast of events by making regular visits to the ASC website.

 5.          Treasurer’s Report and Presentation of the Annual Accounts – Raz Khan

 A copy of the accounts for the year ended 30^th April 2007 was attached to the Agenda. The proposal to accept the accounts was made by Randy Banks and seconded by Mike Trotman and Peter Wills.

The Treasurer stated that there has been an overall increase in ASC funds in the last year but that actually £16,000 has been spent  as only a single one-day conference was held. The increase in funds is due to advance payments for the September 2007 international conference.

The Treasurer stressed that the ASC is a non-profit organisation and that the proceeds from the international conferences contribute to the running of the ASC in subsequent years. He added that the main expenditure is the administrator who supports the volunteer committee in organising conferences. In addition to this the ASC has been funding evening meetings in association with the MRS to provide more frequent opportunities to get together.

The financial strategy of the ASC is to maintain sufficient cash to fund future activities without borrowing.

The Treasurer finished by asking members to continue to support the ASC conferences in order that the ASC can continue to provide a platform whereby survey practitioners can meet and learn from each other.

6.          Election to the Executive Committee – Steve Taylor

Under paragraph 7.1 of the Constitution, the following members of the Executive Committee were required to seek re-election:

No other nominations had been received and therefore the above-listed members were declared duly elected.

7.          Honorary Life Members – Laurance Gerrard

There have been four Honorary Life Members hitherto: Hugh Neffendorf; Steve Elder; Beverly Rowe; and Andrew Westlake. Earlier this year nominations were invited for Honorary Life Members.

The Chairman announced four new life members, all of whom have contributed greatly to the aims and to the success of the ASC over many years.

They are, in alphabetical order:

Mick Couper    
Hugh Gentleman
Steve Jenkins
Malcolm Rigg

The Chairman asked members to join him in congratulating them.

8.          Announcement of shortlist for the MRS/ASC joint Award for Technology Effectiveness – AJ Johnson

This international award, first presented in 2003, is organised annually by the ASC in association with the MRS. It is awarded for outstanding innovation in the application of software or technology to market, opinion and social research in achieving greater effectiveness in research.

Previous winners have been Research Reporter, Bellview Fusion, E-Tabs Enterprise and Harmoni

This year saw a large and wide range of entries across the world of Market Research world.

The panel of judges has reached a decision and the finalists (in alphabetical order) are as follows.

The winner will be announced at the MRS Awards Dinner in December.

9.          Any Other Business

There was no other business.