CDR provides independent organizational research through three principal service areas: the Business Diagnostic Instrument, our Association Efficacy Assessment, and selected Custom Research projects.
Each engagement is designed to produce clear, decision-relevant evidence, supported by rigorous methodology and direct senior involvement.
What it is:
The Business Diagnostic Instrument is CDR’s flagship organizational diagnostic. It provides a broad, evidence-based assessment of the conditions influencing organizational performance and identifies how leadership, communication, resources, work processes, and other internal factors interact.
Who it is for:
Established organizations facing persistent, complex, or interconnected internal issues, particularly where leaders need a reliable organizational baseline before deciding what to address.
Why it matters:
Visible problems are often symptoms rather than causes. The BDI helps leaders identify the underlying organizational conditions shaping performance so that effort and resources can be directed where they are most likely to produce meaningful improvement.
What it is:
The Association Efficacy Assessment is an independent examination of how effectively an association understands and serves its members. It can explore member priorities, engagement, perceived value, service effectiveness, strategic direction, and emerging needs.
Who it is for:
Professional, political, public-sector, retiree, and other member-based associations seeking credible evidence to support governance, planning, advocacy, or service decisions.
Why it matters:
Boards and executives often hear most clearly from the most active or vocal members. A structured assessment provides a broader and more representative view of the membership, helping leaders identify what members value, where expectations are changing, and where the association should focus next.
What it is:
Custom Research consists of purpose-built qualitative, quantitative, or mixed-method studies designed around a specific organizational question. Projects may include surveys, interviews, administrative-data analysis, statistical modelling, program evaluation, or the integration of several evidence sources.
Who it is for:
Organizations facing a complex, sensitive, or highly specialized issue that cannot be adequately addressed through routine reporting or an off-the-shelf instrument.
Why it matters:
Good organizational research requires more than collecting data. It requires the right question, an appropriate design, rigorous analysis, and interpretation grounded in context. Custom Research provides that capability without requiring the organization to maintain a permanent internal research unit.
The most useful research engagements begin with a clearly defined decision problem rather than a predetermined methodology.
CDR works with clients to identify the underlying question the organization is trying to answer, the decision that the research is intended to support, the evidence already available, and any practical constraints involving timing, access, confidentiality, or organizational capacity.
In some cases, the appropriate approach is immediately apparent. In others, the initial issue presented by the client may prove to be a symptom of a broader organizational problem, or several apparently separate concerns may be driven by the same underlying condition.
For that reason, CDR does not begin by selecting a survey, interview process, or analytical technique. The research design is developed around the problem itself, with the objective of producing evidence that is both methodologically sound and genuinely useful for decision-making.