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Greg Wayman, Regional Director for ORC International, comments,
“There is probably a move towards greater transparency (in
solutions). So, while a company may have a preferred and structured approach, it has to have the ability to be customised to suit the
business needs of the client.”
Piers Lee, Managing Director of BDRC Asia, comments, “the BDRC
Group’s proprietary techniques are not black-box solutions, but are
instead analytical frameworks that are transparent, allowing the
clients to see how the insight has been derived. The downside is
the transparency makes them easy to replicate by competitors, but
being the pioneers of these techniques, we are best placed to use
them to the greatest effect.”
Some companies seek to defend their solutions through intellectual
property protection. The ZMET qualitative technique from OZA in
the US is actually a patented technique. However, it is trademarking that has been used most by firms to create identity and brand
recognition for their solutions. Neil Gains from TapestryWorks has
trademarked several frameworks and approaches, and comments,
“We use trademarking to establish authority and precedence in the
use of our approaches, all of which we have also published in Brand
esSense and through our company blog. Trademarking does not
protect us from being copied, but is an important part of establishing
our credibility in developing original and professionally recognised
approaches that can reassure clients.”
Despite the discussions over products and solutions, all the industry
pundits agree that the main competitive advantage of agencies will
come through attracting and retaining the best talent in the industry.
Jon Foged, Managing Director of TNS Singapore, comments, “our
business is only as strong as our people, and we need to build and
nurture the talents of our employees, supporting them to develop
into truly client-centric consultants who can apply their commercial
focus and deep expertise to address clients’ business challenges.”
Samy Mardolker, Managing Director of ORC International
Singapore, feels that innovation and proprietary solutions can be
a bit of a “wild card”, and concurs with most of the industry that
it will ultimately be about finding and retaining the best talent. He
comments, “it was people, it is people, and it will be people. Everything boils down to the passionate and intellectually curious
research mind (of the individual).”

THE DARK SIDE
Competition has raised standards in many respects (e.g. by encouraging innovation and setting higher standards for the industry). But
the counter-argument is that with so much competition, there has
been something of a race to the bottom on pricing as competitors
try to undercut each other. Cut-throat pricing and “over promising” to
clients can result in corner-cutting, particularly in areas of fieldwork,
focus group recruitment, and getting access to hard-to-reach
audiences.
But problems also arise when agencies simply cannot attract the
right talent.
Since the industry pundits concur that the core of competitive
advantage is in the people, it is perhaps not surprising that some
agencies seek to impose restrictive trade practices to prevent the
staff that they hire from competing against them as soon as they
leave their company.
It is not uncommon for agencies to impose restraints on trade
through staff employmen t contracts. Since lawyers are usually paid
by the hour, they are quite happy to draw up elaborate employment
contracts for companies, even if they might contravene the trade
and competition laws in the country.
The most common restrictive clause is the “non-compete clause” in
its various forms; for example, where employees who leave organisations cannot solicit clients or staff from their former company for a
specified period. This is often a bit of grey area since “solicitation”,
directly or indirectly, can be open to interpretation.
It is alleged that an agency in Singapore even put in place a directive
whereby staff could only join a specific competitor if “written permission” was given by the employer (which they could theoretically
block), even though this was not in the employee’s contract. Such
directives are likely to get companies into trouble with the Ministry of
Manpower, since they are a mechanism that can stop the free flow
of labour in the market. It could also be viewed as a violation of civil
liberties. In the example given, the staff member complained that
she was required to go through multiple high-stress exit interviews
before permission was given to join the competitor firm.
More elaborate non-compete clauses are where agencies try to
impose this at an international level. In one example, an employ-

JUNE 2014 I ASIA RESEARCH 3