Deborah Donaldson

Deborah has had a varied career, with a number of senior corporate roles that have made a solid contribution to her success as a researcher at Synovate. These include Sales & Marketing Manager of an inner-city hotel (the flagship of one of Southern Africa’s largest hotel chains) and Warehouse & Distribution Manager for Cairns Holdings (the first woman to be appointed to this position). Deborah was also a Director of one of the region's most successful electrical contracting companies, and for fun, made herself useful by undertaking freelance Public Relations Management & Administration for the Zimbabwe Cricket Association when Zimbabwe hosted the Black Caps & Australian tours in 2000.

An outgoing and perennially curious researcher, Deborah is equally at home with major quantitative projects as she is conducting qualitative research, and was an important part of the research team that won the Social & Community Research Award at the 2004 Market Research Effectiveness Awards. After extensive work on the ASB account, she is now a key researcher on both the ASB and Commonwealth Bank of Australia account teams, and also includes Sanitarium, Unitec, Diabetes NZ and the New Zealand Blood Service in her portfolio.