What happens when a pollster becomes a legislator? How does a career exploring and measuring public opinion help serve Canadians as a Senator?

Senator Dr. Donna Dasko was appointed to the Senate by Prime Minister Trudeau on June 6, 2018.

She is my guest on this episode of inFocus with David Coletto.

Prior to her appointment, she was Senior Vice-President at Environics Research Group where she lead major research studies for federal and provincial governments, private sector clients, and NGOs. 

Senator Dasko is also a co-founded and National Chair of Equal Voice, a non-partisan organization aimed at electing more women in Canada.

Senator Dasko joined me on the podcast to discuss her career as a pollster and how her experience has impacted her work as a Senator at the centre of national public policy making.

In 2011, the UN General Assembly adopted a resolution that recognized happiness as a “fundamental human goal” and called for “a more inclusive, equitable and balanced approach to economic growth that promotes the happiness and well-being of all peoples”.

In 2012 the first-ever UN conference on Happiness took place and the UN General Assembly adopted a resolution which decreed that the International Day of Happiness would be observed every year on March 20.

As we approach International Happiness Day, I wonder, how happy do Canadians think they are? And what impacts our perception of happiness?     

On this episode, I’m joined by two of my colleagues from Abacus Data – Richard Jenkins and Oksana Kishchuk.

Oksana and Richard lead our firm’s Happiness Monitor program, a research focus we started in October of 2020 that tracks how happy or not Canadians are at any given moment and explores what makes us happy and what makes us sad.

Our conversation looks at what we have learned so far, why measuring happiness is so important, and what drives national happiness, especially during a global pandemic.

For more information about Abacus Data's Happiness Monitor, please visit our website to find all the analyses and data we have released so far: https://abacusdata.ca/tag/happiness/And you can find the most recent analysis on happiness in Canada vs. the US here: https://abacusdata.ca/happiness-canadians-americans/

On this episode of inFocus with David Coletto, I'm joined by Dr. Jean-Francois Daoust, a lecturer in the Department of Politics and International Relations at the University of Edinburgh.

Dr. Daoust is co-author, with Dr. Andre Blais, of a book titled “The Motivation to Vote” which was published in 2020 by UBC Press.

Although we spend a lot of time talking about which party or candidate is up or down in the polls, or which issues voters care most about, elections are fundamentally about the act of voting.

Why do people vote? Why do others stay home? And what role do perceptions, attitudes and values play in voter turnout?

In the book, Blais and Daoust write, “Voting is a quintessential human decision, based on a combination of emotions and instrumental calculations, full of complexities, ambiguities, and sometimes contradictions.” Lots for us to unpack.

In our conversation, we explore voting, talk about his book and go deep exploring why some people vote and others don’t.

If you haven’t read the book, I strongly recommend it.

On this episode of the podcast, I’m joined by Eric Grenier, a senior writer and polls analyst at CBC. For over 10 years, Eric has been tracking the ups and downs of polls in Canada and manages the CBC’s poll tracker and seat projections. It’s been a pleasure to know him for most that time. He started doing seat projections right around the time I started Abacus Data.

He is, to some, Canada’s Nate Silver. Or maybe it’s more apt to describe Nate Silver as America’s Eric Grenier. Either way, I’m really pleased he agreed to join the podcast.

We talked about his journey to doing this work, how his seat projection model works, and what he’s seeing in recent polls and what we might expect within a possible federal election in 2021.

In this special episode of inFocus with David Coletto, David shares the results of his polling company's latest poll on Canadian politics.

The full poll can be found at: https://abacusdata.ca/liberals-regain-lead-brighten-mood-canada/

The questions you ask are more important than the answers you get. I think that should be the mantra of every public opinion researcher and consumer of polls.

More important, good researchers must be inquisitive, open-minded, and prepared to understand and appreciate the true nature of the human being who is about to be tasked with completing your questionnaire.

My guest this week on inFocus knows a thing or two about writing survey questionnaires. She wrote a book about it.

Dr. Annie Pettit is a public opinion and market researcher with more than 20 years experience working with some of the leading research agencies in Canada. Dr. Pettit has a PhD in psychology from York University where she specialized in online survey data quality. She currently consults for a range of traditional and technology research suppliers, is a member of the Canadian Research Insights Council Standards Committee, and is chair of the Canadian ISO standards committee.

She’s also the author of the book “People Aren’t Robots: A practical guide to the psychology and technique of questionnaire design” published in 2016.

She joined me this week to talk about asking questions, writing questionnaires, and why this step in the research process is so important.

Bruce Anderson is one of Canada’s leading public affairs and communications professionals. He’s worked for Prime Ministers, Premiers, and has lead research projects for some of North America’s leading associations, corporations, and non-profits.

He’s also my partner at Abacus Data.

On this episode of inFocus, Bruce and I spend some time talking about public affairs research. Public affairs research represents a good portion of the work our team at Abacus Data does. We work with many national associations, corporations, unions, and charities – helping them understand the opinion landscape, measuring and tracking their reputations, and producing content to help tell their story to government and other stakeholders.

I can’t think of anyone better to explore this topic with, as he’s been one of Canada’s best at it for over three decades.

Today we let inside the debates and discussions Bruce and I have and give you some perspective on how we approach public opinion research.

On this first episode of inFocus, I’m joined by one of the founders of Canadian modern polling, Frank Graves. Frank is the founder and president of Ekos Research Associates. 

He has been studying Canadian public opinion for over 40 years – working with governments, non-profits, unions, and businesses to understand the dynamics of Canadian public opinion.

I sat down with Frank just before the holidays to discuss his approach to public opinion research and what his experience over the past 40 years has taught him about what Canadians think and why they think what they do.

Welcome to my new podcast, inFocus with David Coletto.

In this short episode, I share the vision for the pod and give some details on what to expect from the first dozen or so episodes.

Please subscribe so you don't miss the first episode scheduled to drop in late February 2021.

If you love politics, polling, public policy or if you work in politics, government relations, public relations, or market research - this podcast is for you.