Public Engagement & Qualitative Analysis.

Public consultation can garner many, often lengthy, submissions, and it can be difficult to manage all the information received in order to gain a thorough understanding of the most important issues, and what people think on those issues. Also, it can be difficult to understand how groups (business-owners, residents, visitors) differ in their opinions. Add the diversity of responses, from professional submissions to grass-roots local communities and making sense of everything can be a challenge.

Our staff read all submissions, analysing them to identify all themes, topics and opinions, then report comprehensive findings back to your organisation. We ensure that the relative importance of each issue (as evidenced by the weight of opinions) is reported clearly so everyone can get an accurate understanding of what submitters think. Our experience and independence gives you and your stakeholders confidence in the results.

When organisations ask open-ended questions of stakeholders to inform their decision-making, responses can be lengthy and numerous, and cannot be accurately conveyed by sample quotes or lists. Collating and grouping topics using thematic analysis is a much more informative approach, when seeking to understand what customers, citizens or stakeholders are saying.

Organisations who don’t have the time or capacity to analyse comments totalling thousands of words can get meaningful insights by deploying the Global Research team. We thoroughly consider every answer, complete thematic analysis and present findings in written reports supported by visualisations and infographics. You very quickly find out what everyone thinks on the questions you consider important.

When you have collected written ideas, comments or submissions during a public engagement project and need analysis to gain a thorough understanding of the opinions expressed, including the most significant and contentious issues, Global Research can help.

We collate, read and thematically analyse all the data received during community engagement/consultation projects. Our thematic analysis and reporting identifies what contributors think about all issues discussed, identifying the most commented on, most dividing and areas of common thinking. Our qualitative analysis is comprehensive and thorough, including all feedback, no matter how it is collected, down to those one-off ideas that may be the game changer for your project. Our experience and independence gives you and your stakeholders confidence in the results.

When you pursue a deep understanding of why people have particular opinions, or you seek new and enlightening ideas, qualitative methods are the most effective. Whether it be focus groups, semi-structured interviews, online platforms or open-ended survey comments, thoughts need to be effectively collected and analysed so that other peoples’ ideas can inform your thinking. If you need to capture and analyse the ideas of your customers, community, stakeholders or even your own staff we are here to help.

A qualitative research approach collects non-numeric data in verbal, visual or written formats and presents it thematically, so that ideas and meaning can be extracted. We turn reams of ideas into concise and easy-to-access reports. Our team presents the ideas we uncover in easily-digested and actionable formats. At Global Research we use specialist software, NVivo, to assist with analysis. We are able to quickly and efficiently manage opinions and ideas, and can run queries relating to particular contributor variables. Modern presentation approaches are used to complement our thematic analysis, such as visualisations, data models and infographics.

Many organisations seek social-media comments from a range of platforms, but don’t make full use of this free insightful information. They may not be aware that thematic analysis can provide deep insights or don’t know how to extract informative meaning. People who communicate about your business via Facebook, TripAdvisor, LinkedIn or Twitter provide a wealth of valuable insights about your business or organisation. The information sits dormant, waiting to inform your organisation on what your customers are thinking.

Our thematic analysis is the process of garnering meaning from text. We explore ideas for key themes, going beyond simple word searches or sentiment analysis which can be blunt, partially-informative and misleading. Global Research completes social media thematic analysis for organisations so that they don’t have to trawl through reams of pages to find out what people are thinking, and end up confused. Mining that data in a systematic and thorough way using humans, not robots, can reveal insights which are valuable and potential game-changers for your business or organisation.