Andrew Enns has his finger on the pulse of Manitoba.
The Winnipeg-based executive vice-president for Leger’s central Canada region oversees a team of research and analytics experts who compile how Manitobans and Canadians are thinking about everything from inflation and interest rates to their voting intentions in the next federal election.
“Information is king. In this environment where things can change quite rapidly with technology and the way information travels, you can’t be certain what the market is thinking at any given time. Data helps you understand that,” he says.
Leger does a lot of work with the public sectors across Canada, including local Crown Corporations such as Manitoba Hydro, Manitoba Public Insurance and Manitoba Liquor & Lotteries (ML & L), as well as the business-to-business sector.
“We can find out what Manitobans are thinking and how their actions, like discretionary spending on entertainment, might be changing. We’re trying to understand how customer behaviour is changing so businesses can be proactive and stay ahead of those behaviours,” he says.
One recent example was research conducted for ML&L to help it understand how the recent explosion in online betting companies across Canada was presenting opportunities and challenges for the corporation in the province.
Leger also works with not-for-profit organizations and advertising/communication agencies, helping them develop new marketing campaigns.
Enns says the way research is conducted has changed over his 23 years in the business. It used to be that virtually all of its work was done on the phone—landlines—but that moved to cell phones and now most of its work is done over the Internet.
“We maintain the largest proprietary research panel in the country with nearly half a million Canadians participating in it. We’re also using lists provided by clients to do research directly with their customers, if that is required,” he says.
Leger is the largest Canadian-owned research company in the country with offices in seven cities. It also recently expanded its operations in the U.S, increasing the company’s full and part-time workforce to more than 600 across North America.
