Andrew Zhao
Andrew is a curious and driven researcher with a strong reputation for distilling large, complicated datasets into clear, actionable insights for clients. He has extensive experience conducting research for clients across numerous sectors, including finance, pensions, education, environment, transportation, not-for-profit and non-governmental organizations, and municipal and provincial governments.
In addition to his role as a researcher, Andrew is Pollara’s Director of Advanced Analytics, applying his expert use of a wide array of industry-leading advanced statistical techniques to most Pollara projects. Holding a specialized skillset, he is always eager to leverage cutting-edge analytical methods in order to provide a deeper, more accurate, and more strategic lens onto the data.
Andrew also plays a leading role in managing our groundbreaking election polling subscription service. Subscribed to by a wide range of private and association sector clients, this service conducts more than 1,000 survey interviews per day throughout the writ period of an election campaign via live-interviewer telephone, IVR, online panel, and social media platforms like Facebook – and merges, analyses, and presents the results in realtime on our interactive online dashboard.
Prior to joining Pollara, Andrew worked at Forum Research. He got his start in research at the University of Toronto as a Research Assistant to Professor Neil Nevitte, where he graduated at the top of his program with an Honours B.A. in Political Science. He was also a student journalist. His academic work focussed on elections, political behaviour, research methods, and the immigrant experience in democracies. Andrew is also the Executive Director of the Seminar on the United Nations and International Affairs (SUNIA), a member of the International Political Science Association (IPSA), and sits on the board of the Harold Innis Foundation.