Word on the street is that, contrary to multiple published reports in the media, former Vision Critical CEO, longtime respected pollster Dr. Angus Reid, was escorted from the premises of the market research company that, as the company’s website states, “builds engaged, secure communities of customers … for ongoing, real-time feedback and insight.”
According to our sources, both company management and staff had lost faith in Vision Critical to perform to expectation on the community consultation front — manipulation of community engagement data was never a core economic component that contributed to Vision Critical’s bottom line, and the cloud-based community forum software developed by Angus Reid was, at best, an adjunct function for the company, whose main business is designed to conduct closed market research for multi-national companies, to build product/company loyalty among members of the public.
Vision Critical was co-founded by Angus Reid, with his son Andrew, in 2000. The Reid family remain the company’s largest shareholder.
In August 2012, Vision Critical received a $20 million investment from OMERS Ventures, an arm of the Ontario municipal employees’ pension fund.
At the time of this writing, there remains widespread speculation in the investment community that Vision Critical is preparing for an initial public offering (IPO), or stock launch, where shares of stock in the company will be sold to the general public — we have been told that many in Vision Critical feel the company’s largely unsuccessful, and far from lucrative, foray into the political, local-based community consultation realm was hurting the prospects for a successful IPO, necessary to raise expansion capital to consolidate the company’s future as a global marketing player.
What does all of the above have to do with Vancouver municipal politics?
In their most recent term of office, in particular, the Vision Vancouver-led majority Vancouver City Council has consistently taken hits from neighbourhood activists for their sham community consultation process.
In order to shore up the optics on the community engagement front, the Vision-led Council awarded an untendered contract to Vision Critical, to launch Talk Vancouver.com, a cloud-based community consultation forum.
Quoting from Bob Mackin’s January 2nd story in the Vancouver Courier …
Vision Critical, PlaceSpeak.com, Gravit-e Technologies, Mustel Research and Sentis Market Research were among 22 companies pre-qualified in 2012 for city hall communications and research projects. When it pondered a citizen engagement website in early 2013, city staff considered only Vision Critical.
An open, public call normally happens for city contracts worth $75,000 and up. The price for the two-year Vision Critical contract is $152,080.
By comparison, the City of Toronto published a Dec. 13 (2013) notice seeking quotations from companies for “provision of an online consultation tool” for the City Manager’s office. The bid deadline is Jan. 8, 2014 for a one-year contract with a one-year option.
Note: subsequent to the letting of the consultation tool request for proposal (RFP), the City of Toronto cancelled its call for the development of an online consultation tool, stating privacy concerns, as well as a lack of confidence that cloud-based engagement software could meet the City’s mandate for “open, fair, and transparent municipal consultation processes.”
From the outset, many in the public have expressed concern that the Vision Critical developed Talk Vancouver cloud-based community consultation software was little more than a taxpayer-funded, underhanded attempt by Vision Vancouver to data mine information about, and manufacturer the consent of, the Vancouver electorate, in the lead up to the November 15, 2014 civic election — Talk Vancouver, then, as a wolf in sheep’s clothing, and a data-mining community consultation masquerade.
Dr. Angus Reid has “retired” from an active role in Vision Critical, a company he co-founded. An untendered contract was awarded to the company’s former CEO. Does Dr. Reid remain, as stated in the Mackin story, Mayor Gregor Robertson’s “dollar-a-year technology and citizen engagement adviser?” Will the company fulfill the terms of its contract, or was it ever even intended to do so? And, what happens to the “intelligence” that is gathered through Talk Vancouver, where’s the transparency in the reporting out, and what role has the cloud-based software played, if any role at all, in determining policy development in the City of Vancouver?
