Decima Research

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Decima Research is a public opinion and market research company in Canada, founded in 1979 by Progressive Conservative Party of Canada strategist Allan Gregg.

Gregg left Decima in 1994 and went in to semi-retirement following the electoral disaster for the Progressive Conservatives in the 1993 election in which he was the key communications strategist for the party. Decima floundered for several years but rebounded and is now one of the most respected opinion polling firms on voting intentions in Canada. Along with Ipsos-Reid, Decima conducts regular polling of the federal political scene in Canada on a regular basis whether or not an election campaign is in progress.

Decima Research is sometimes known as Opinion Search, which is technically the name of an affiliated calling centre that they always use for their field work.

Decima research invests a significant amount of time and money into process improvement, and has a department dedicated solely to research and development. The investments related to internal systems spans both Decima and Opinion Search.

[edit] Opinion Search

The Opinion Search call-center is based in Ottawa, Ontario but has its largest location in its Montreal office, with over 96 booths, and another smaller call-center in Toronto.

The Montreal Call-Centre of Opinion Search is staffed by over 800 employees alongside 10-15 part-time staff and 9 full-time staff members. The current full-time management includes 1 field manager, 3 field supervisors, 1 "team leader" and HR staff for all employees. Any part-time or full-time staff was commonly hired based upon performance and familiarity with fieldwork. Opinion Search does higher externally but only when home grown talent is not found.

The Ottawa Call-Center of Opinion Search is staffed by approximately 1000 employees alongside 40+ part-time staff and 12 full-time staff members.

Opinion Search is also affiliated with Focus Search which is a division within the company that conducts focus groups.