MRS and AQR are jointly hosting this webinar to celebrate 2 years of the Recruiter Accreditation Scheme.

We would like to invite you to this webinar to learn more about the Recruiter Accreditation Scheme and join a discussion to help shape it's future. 

The scheme has been developed by MRS and the Association for Qualitative Research (AQR) to raise the profile and status of recruiters, by devising a training and accreditation scheme that recognises the knowledge, skills and competence of professional recruiters.

The overall aim of the scheme is to improve the quality of qualitative recruitment by all parties throughout the qualitative recruitment supply-chain. 

The scheme has now been running for 2 years so this is a perfect time to review the effectiveness and robustness of this important accreditation.

You will hear the perspective of an accredited company and an accredited recruiter and learn about the evolutions planned for the scheme - including a brand new MRS Operations Award for Recruitment Excellence! 

Join our hosts Debrah Harding and Rachael Penny on 28th November at 11am

Debrah is responsible for all MRS operations and leads the Society’s standards, policy and public affairs activities. Debrah graduated from Southampton University in the early 90’s with an honours degree in Geography.
She first worked in accountancy and then moved to the Audit Bureau of Circulation (ABC) in 1994. After working in auditing and compliance for ABC, she joined the management of MRS in 1999 to establish a new Standards and Policy department.
Debrah is the co-author (with Peter Jackson) of the book, Quality in Market Research: from Theory to Practice and is also a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.
Abi has worked within market research operations for 20 yrs. Roles have included qualitative recruiter, fieldwork project manager and now MD of a leading fieldwork company.
Her role as Managing Director of Acumen sees her running the business on a day to day basis but she’s still just as happy to roll up her sleeves and help out on any project.
Excellence in recruitment is at the heart of everything Acumen does and she is passionate about helping clients connect with the best participants to really make their projects pop!


Deanne from has worked as a recruiter, within the market research industry for nearly 20 years.

She is a joint Director of iPoint Market Research together with her husband Marc, but both have very different roles in running the business. As well as doing recruitment, Deanne is involved in the day to day running of the company which involves business development, marketing, building relationships with clients and project management.

Deanne says the RAS makes me feel more recognised by the industry and as a result of being accredited, companies are more likely to pass on work to me, knowing I have taken the time to take the relevant qualification.


Rachael is a Director at Criteria Fieldwork and has been an AQR board member since 2018.
Joining Criteria in 2007 Rachael is responsible for a team of project managers and has lots of experience managing qualitative research projects across a range of methodologies including consumer, business & social research. She is passionate about working closely with clients, becoming an extension of the research team to help ensure recruitment and the project runs as smoothly as possible.
As well as being part of the Recruiter Accreditation Scheme working group, Rachael helps to organise AQR events and parties and is the AQR representative at the IQCS.


Penny Steele is the Managing Director of Steele Fieldworks Ltd, a recruitment and fieldwork agency
She has over 30 years’ experience of fieldwork and project management. In 2005 Penny became Chairman of the IQCS Council and has responsibility for minimum fieldwork standards and their annual Quality Awards. Penny is also the IQCS representative on the Market Research Quality Standards Advisory Board and its role is to develop and maintain minimum standards for market, social and opinion research, data collection and data processing in the UK. She is a Fellow of the Market Research Society.
Currently, she is involved with the MRS/AQR Recruiter Accreditation Scheme Working Party. Since the first Awards in 2015, Penny has chaired the MRS Operations Awards Judging panel. Previously Penny has served on the AQR Committee, the MRS Accredited Interviewer Training scheme and the Respondent Interviewer Interface committee.



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