The Foresight Group Integrates With TNS’ Global Stakeholder Management

TNS and The Foresight Group aim to bridge the divide between marketing and HR departments

London, UK – TNS, the world’s largest custom research agency, today announced that employee research expert The Foresight Group, will be integrated into its Global Stakeholder Management division as of January 2010. Both companies are part of Kantar, the world’s largest insight, information and consultancy network.

A US-based company, Foresight specialises in monitoring employee perceptions and identifying issues affecting growth and productivity. Foresight’s international clients range from a variety of sectors including financial services, retail, manufacturing and healthcare. Foresight will work with TNS’ existing TRI*M business, which is the world leader in stakeholder relationship research. Foresight was formerly a division of Lightspeed Research, another Kantar operating company.

“Reflecting the growing trend toward integrated metrics, customer satisfaction and employee research are now being managed in a more concerted way. Companies are increasingly recognizing how employees’ engagement and behaviour impacts their customer and business performance,” said David Kieselstein, CEO of TNS North America. “There is a growing need to understand the interdependencies of employee engagement and customer loyalty. TNS’ stakeholder management area of expertise has a wealth of more 16,000 studies in this area globally. When we combine this with Foresight’s ability to understand employee engagement; we are in an excellent position to offer clients stronger integrated insight into maximizing stakeholder relationships.”

”We are currently seeing an increased need for understanding and measuring engagement from employees and customers as a result of recent economic and corporate changes,” said Michael Schroeder, CEO of The Foresight Group. “Combining TNS’ large distribution and consulting network and Foresight’s strong employee research offering means we can be an authority on employee and customer behavioural patterns helping our clients achieve higher performance levels.”

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About TNS
TNS, who recently merged with Research International, is the world’s largest custom research agency delivering actionable insights and research-based business advice to its clients so they can make more effective business decisions. TNS offers comprehensive industry knowledge within the Consumer, Technology, Finance, Automotive and Political & Social sectors, supported by a unique product offering that stretches across the entire range of marketing and business issues, specializing in product development & innovation, brand & communication, stakeholder management, retail & shopper, and qualitative research. Delivering best-in-class service across more than 75 countries, TNS is part of Kantar, the world’s largest research, insight and consultancy network. Please visit www.tnsglobal.com for more information.

About Kantar
Kantar is one of the world’s largest insight, information and consultancy networks. By uniting the diverse talents of its 13 specialist companies, the group aims to become the pre-eminent provider of compelling and inspirational insights for the global business community. Its 26,500 employees work across 95 countries and across the whole spectrum of research and consultancy disciplines, enabling the group to offer clients business insights at each and every point of the consumer cycle. The group’s services are employed by over half of the Fortune Top 500 companies.

For further information, please visit us at www.kantar.com

The Foresight Group
The Foresight Group, part of the Kantar Group, is a leader in survey research, consulting and technology. The Foresight Group helps global companies convert employee and customer survey data into actions that create a more engaged high performance workforce and increase customer loyalty. The company’s expertise in employee engagement, high performance organizations, and extensive normative benchmark data, delivered through a proprietary ASP survey technology, has made them an industry leader in employee research. Please visit www.foresightint.com for more information.