I came across an Ad in the newspaper recently, it was a market research company looking for a particular type of healthcare professional to conduct executive phone interviews. I am in a different healthcare profession, but I decided to write them to find out more, and to see if maybe they would have a need for someone in my area to conduct such phone interviews. I usually have 1-2 days off each week (during the week) and wouldn't mind doing something different and challenging, and get paid for it, from home..gee, what more could you ask for?

Anyway, they responded to me, promptly asked me to fax them my resume, which I did. Within a couple of hours, I got a call from them. They explained, at first, the basics of what this work would entail........making it sound quite harmless.....they give you a list of "study questions" and a list of contacts to make (drug companies, etc)....and you get paid $150 for each study you complete......she indicated that the goal of these studies is to determine the company they're working for, "target market."

Sounded too good to be true, no? Sit at home and drink coffee while talking on the phone for good money that would likely take only a couple of hours (there's about 4-5 questions per study, she said).

Of course being the analytical person I am, I asked more questions.

She told me, however, that at no time was I to let the companies/people I was calling KNOW that I was doing so on behalf of a market research company......that basically I would have to come up with a way to explain why *I* was wanting to know this info.

So I said to her, "well, why would anyone give out the kind of information I'd be seeking, when it would sound questionable as to why *I* would want to know.....I asked her why they wouldn't be quite suspicious as to my motives.....

She basically indicated that sometimes it takes a bit of "creativity" but if I didn't feel comfortable with doing it, or if I didn't feel it ethical, of course I didn't have to.

I personally have no problem at all with market research, I feel it's very vital. BUT I do have a very huge problem with using my title to try and elicit information from companies, and being untruthful as to WHY I am seeking the information.

Is this a common thing? Is this just how market researchers operate? It seems awfully fraudulent and unethical to me. It seems to me that this market research company (now not sure if this is common practice or if this is simply the practices of this particular one) is deviously trying to get information for a company that they're working for, to end up benefitting that company, by using other people to do their dirty work.......and maybe doing this as they do it (getting people like me to try and trick other people into providing the info) so that they would never be held liable.......because it's not them that's doing the "digging." ??

Interestingly enough, I just received an email from this company, with a "Terms of Confidentiality" policy that I would need to read and sign prior to working for them. For some reason, there isn't an attachment there, so for my own curiosity I can't even read what it says........but I suspect it's something more to cover their arses should things ever get ugly.......and so that someone like myself would never be able to disclose what this covert process is.

In good faith and because I have strong personal and professional ethics, I will not take this job....but I'm just really curious if this is common practice? I find it quite deplorable that they seek healthcare professionals to do their dirty work, assuming of course that we can use our "title" to *their advantage. Of course if the sh*t ever hit the fan, it would be us professionals who could left holding the bag...for being deceitful, dishonest, and likely even discrediting our respective professions.

Thoughts?

[moimeme]

Ever heard of secret shoppers? It is my understanding that behind-the-scenes work is common practice as part of market research. The market research organization is required to keep the identity of the client confidential; in order to do so, they may ask you to fudge an answer when you are asked who wants the information. If you reply that you are doing market research, the caller will want to know for whom and then may deduce the name of the client.

Hi,
Yes, I'm familiar with what "Mystery Shoppers" do....and I don't really find that to be all that dishonest..I mean, the people who do this (the mystery shoppers)....they're doing things like going to restaurants and reporting back on the service, the food, etc. Or they're going to a store and shopping there, and then reporting on how the sales-staff were, what the prices were like in comparison to other places, etc. It doesn't seem to me that they're telling outright LIES to get the info. They're not making up some story about why they're eating at the particular restaurant, or why they're shopping at that particular store.

With my situation, I (or whoever does it) is expected to tell a bold-faced lie as to why they're calling and using our profession as a way of establishing credibility. That seems much different to me. The type of info they want to collect, from what I've gathered, is pretty confidential info.....the type of secret company info that they wouldn't want ending up in the wrong hands.

Plus, what if I was questioning someone and they became suspicious and asked, "so what is your name?" I wouldn't feel right making up a name, so if I gave my own name, I'm sure someone in their security/legal department could find out who I was..and they could then report me (or someone in my shoes, someone doing this job) to my professional association/licensing body......and I know for a fact that I could not only lose my license temporarily, but permanently. I can't think of any healthcare profession that doesn't have a very strict, strong, well established code of ethics and standards for professionalism. To represent myself as a member of my profession, yet to tell a very bold faced lie as to why I was soliciting the information, that seems extremly unethical to me....and very unethical of this company.

Anybody can be a Mystery Shopper. It doesn't matter what you do for a living, that has no bearing on it. If anything, you're simply gathering information that any patron of that restaurant or customer of that store (or business) can easily get for themself at any time. You're not deviously, to my knowledge, trying to get their trade secrets or the secret ingredients to their world-famous fried chicken recipe that will then be given to their competition, to crush them LOL

There's similarities, yes...but there also seems to be huge differences, to me. Get what I mean?