A wise old owl, not a new kid on the block!

 

 

 

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A wise old owl lived in an oak
The more he saw the less he spoke
The less he spoke the more he heard.
Why can't we all be like that wise old bird?

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Les Winton has been a developer and purveyor of insights for more than 40 years through his activities as a social and market researcher, an evaluator of policies and programs, and an enthusiastic and genuinely inquisitive person.

On leaving Sydney Boys High School in the early 1960s, he spent some time with a Swedish steel company in Australia, before being called up for National Service, serving in Australia and South Vietnam. On return to Australia, he grew his hair very long and wandered off to university where he took part in a number of protest marches and obtained a Bachelors Degree in the social sciences, following this up later with a Master of Arts in Marketing Communication.

To stave off starvation while completing his degree, he took a casual job coding questionnaires at Australian Nationwide Opinion Polls (later ANOP Research Services) for their very first opinion poll in 1971, subsequently embarking on a career in market and social research with the company which eventually led to a shareholding and executive directorship of the company.

Wishing to change direction again, he started his own consultancy Artcraft Research (AR) in 1981 to encompass research-based program evaluation and community and stakeholder consultation and engagement to complement his market and social research activities.  He added Winton Sustainable Research Strategies (WSRS) in 2006 to reflect his growing interest in all things sustainable, and Amazing Insights (AI) in 2012 to challenge research industry thinking, subsequently launching Axis Strategic Consulting in 2017 to carve out a career beyond research and insights.

These days Les (and his consultancy generally) continues to revel in actively pursuing research and evaluation projects, while also enjoying the challenges of community consultation and engagement always with the yearning to reveal fresh insights and new and better strategic solutions to perennial challenges.

Les is a Fellow of the Australian Marketing Institute (FAMI) through which he has Certified Practising Marketer status (CPM), a Fellow of The Research Society (TRS), through which he has Qualified Professsional Researcher status (QPR), and a Member of the Australasian Evaluation Society (AES).

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And then, as the insights emerge:

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Hi, our name is Mandelbrot Quixote.

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With the increasing number of unprecedented political happenings here and all over the world, we are convinced that from now on we will see some of the biggest changes in politics, religion, the law, and communities for a century or more.  The challenge is that few of them will be changes that we would hope for, or that we would even want to live with.

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So, rather than just letting them all happen, we have decided to do something about it, or at least about those things that we can help guide (or actively push) in the right direction when the opportunity arises. As a mentee and doppelganger of Les Winton, we have often made a significant difference by guiding government programs and policies in the right direction, or guiding them away from folly and disaster.  Our research is valid and reliable, our evaluations are sound, and when we develop and provide insights they are research- and evidence-based.

 

However, positioned as a researcher, evaluator and provider of insights means that while we have enjoyed many excellent clients, we have so far been unable to reach those many policy makers and bureaucrats who view robust evidence, good judgement, logical thinking, and wisdom as essential, BUT for whatever reasons see them as the province of strategic consultants to whom they turn, RATHER than to researchers and evaluators. We need to address this paradox!

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So, if you view robust evidence, good judgement, logical thinking, and wisdom as essential, and expect to obtain the best results from researchers, evaluators or insight providers, then please stay with us here!  On the other hand, if you view robust evidence, good judgement, logical thinking, and wisdom as essential, but expect to obtain the best results from strategic consultants, then go and visit us at AxisStrategicConsulting.com ... ​So please call us on 0414 504 832 when you are ready to talk ... you will be very glad you did!

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