Innovation has always been an important and integral part of HRW – both externally and internally. That’s why, every year – we host our internal Innovation challenge! This is an opportunity for the wider team to give lift off to an idea, new approach or solution that they think has the potential to add value to our business and our clients. Ideas can be a centered around a methodology or technique, a new internal process, way of communication or a deliverable – the sky is really the limit. If it can add value to the work that we do – it’s an idea that we want to hear more about! Casting our minds back to last year we had three successful, and inspiring winners – Team Synapse (HRW’s CNS Centre of Excellence), Team Competitive Brand Association Test (a new quant technique to uncover non-conscious brand differentiation) and Team ‘Do it Faster, Do it Smart’ (a system to use technology to automate recruitment updates). With such interesting predecessors we were excited to see what this year brought. We had two awards up for grabs this year that recognize innovation with potential to impact client-facing research and innovation with potential to improve internal processes and employee satisfaction (with cool prizes to be won at the end). After some fierce competition which involved several fantastic entries, we are delighted to announce our 22-23 Innovation Challenge winners! HRW Eavesdrop Lucy Saunders, Director, and Millie Morgan, Research Executive, have won the Auriga Award, named after the constellation “Auriga” or ‘reign holder’ which recognizes innovation with potential to impact client-facing research. The team won this award for their idea ‘HRW Eavesdrop’: a specialized social media listening offering demonstrating market potential and a clear plan for how to leverage our unique expertise to better serve our clients in the digital space. Behavioural Initiatives Alex Petrache, Senior Behavioural Science Analyst, Jeremy Koloski, Senior Behavioural Science Analyst and Tony Jiang, Behavioural Science Analyst have won the “Hercules” Award, named after the constellation “Hercules” or ‘kneeler’ – this award recognizes innovation with potential to improve internal processes and employee satisfaction. The team won this award for their entry focusing on the use of behavioural science to boost internal initiatives – demonstrating ways to leverage our in-house expertise to reduce waste of resources and ultimately improve satisfaction with processes across our business. A huge congratulations to our winners and everyone else who took part and made the challenge a success. Until next year! By Jess Woodhead, Vice President Apply Now!