Tash Walker: imagination over efficiency

The Mix on deep ethnography for Nike, the CFO test, and why the winners in the AI era will be the most imaginative, not the most efficient.

Tash Walker has been an advocate for good work in insights and market research for over a decade, working with clients who want to truly understand people and build brands for the long term. When she talks about her work I feel a mix of admiration and envy: it’s clear that The Mix is landing the kind of projects everyone in the research industry wants to do, but rarely gets the chance to. I sat down with her to talk about the state of strategic insights, her view on good work, client dynamics and, of course, AI.

Deep ethnography for Nike

I opened by asking about a recent piece of work, and what made it good. She had just come off a deep ethnography project for Nike, one of those research pieces on a delicate, challenging space (mental health) for an iconic brand going through disruption and changes in senior leadership.

The client had a real understanding of the need for safety, and the sense of commitment to doing the right thing in the right way was incredibly high. The work felt genuinely meaningful, like new ground being broken in how to understand a topic that’s tough.Tash Walker, The Mix

Nike, like many brands from tech to CPG, is navigating disruption, so I asked Tash how she sees it playing out. Her answer was pragmatic but encouraging, reframing the problem and hinting at what we’re actually here to do.

There’s a lot of swirl, a lot of job changes going on, and we have to have empathy for our clients because they are themselves being disrupted. We also have to see the longer, bigger commercial imperative: why are we here, and how can we help people do a better job of growing?Tash Walker

Demonstrating the value of research

She was direct about what she sees as the industry’s blind spot: a tendency to argue for research on its own terms rather than on commercial ones. But she also zoomed out to ask whether organisations are even asking the right questions. Are they thinking short-term and tactical, or building for the long term? And do their research briefs reflect that ambition?

Research doesn’t exist for its own beautiful purpose. Research exists to fulfil the needs of a bigger organisation to grow, and loads of clients are not growing.Tash Walker

She then added another reframing, one that can feel slightly uncomfortable for those of us who think of qual as a clean, pure vocation:

We’re a service provider to a service provider. And often, as a service provider to marketers who are themselves struggling to make the argument for the validity of marketing, it’s not that surprising there are budget reductions and shifts in power centres.Tash Walker

I still left the call energised, equipped with arguments for why good research matters and with tools to make the commercial case, helping clients pass what she calls the CFO test: demonstrating that investing in longer-term brand building is still worth it.

I strongly believe in our ability to help people.Tash Walker

AI for creative application, not just efficiency

Tash’s perspective on AI also stood out from the usual industry noise. The dominant conversation right now is about efficiency: cheaper, faster, more scalable. She’s not particularly interested in that.

Right now the usage of AI feels like efficiency is the key driver: how can we just make things cheaper and quicker? We’re more interested in the creative application of AI. What’s going to make it a different way of thinking? The arms race is towards more and more of the same things at a cheaper cost or a quicker timeframe, and that isn’t a key differentiator.Tash Walker

She pointed to John Hegarty, founder of BBH, who made a similar argument at Cannes last year: the winners in the AI era won’t be the most efficient operators, but the most imaginative ones.

The people who will win this game are imaginative about its application, not the people just using it for efficiency. We’re experimenting a lot and having interesting conversations. It’s always part of our work, but it can never be seen as the true picture for now, because it’s still unsettled.Tash Walker