The bestselling research author and former Microsoft, Qualtrics and Press Ganey Forsta research executive joins Discuss’ executive team as AI reshapes the research profession
ATLANTA, Sept. 22, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Discuss, the always-on market insights platform, today announced that Luke Williams has joined the company as Chief Research Officer, reporting to CEO Daniel Graff-Radford. Williams brings more than 20 years of research and customer experience leadership from Microsoft, Qualtrics, Press Ganey Forsta, AECOM and Ipsos. He is the co-author of the New York Times bestseller “The Wallet Allocation Rule” and of “Why Loyalty Matters.” Williams will help drive Discuss’ research strategy and reinforce its position that research should be scalable, continuous, and intelligent while keeping humans at the center.
Key Takeaways
- Discuss has named Luke Williams as its first chief research officer, reporting to CEO Daniel Graff-Radford, effective Sept. 14, 2026.
- Williams previously served as Chief Customer Experience and Research Officer at Press Ganey Forsta and held research and customer experience leadership roles at Microsoft, Qualtrics, AECOM and Ipsos.
- Williams is the co-author of the New York Times bestseller “The Wallet Allocation Rule” and of “Why Loyalty Matters.”
- Williams joined Graff-Radford at the company’s Discussions London customer event and a broader tour of Discuss customers within his first weeks at the company.
- The appointment follows Discuss being named a Leader in The Forrester Wave™: Experience Research Platforms, Q1 2026.
AI has changed both how quickly organizations can run research and how much research they can conduct. What hasn’t changed is the need for judgment: knowing which questions actually matter and which findings are worth trusting. Williams has spent more than 20 years embedding that judgment into research programs at some of the world’s largest companies. Discuss created the chief research officer role to establish it as central to how customers use the platform.
Williams has argued that AI increases, rather than diminishes, the value of skilled researchers. Much of his published work connects research methodology directly to financial outcomes by linking what a research team measures to the decisions a business makes. He holds a master’s degree in Research Methodology and Quantitative Methods from Durham University. The appointment comes in the same year Discuss was named a Leader in The Forrester Wave™: Experience Research Platforms, Q1 2026, one of two vendors to receive that designation.
Williams began his time at Discuss in the field. Within his first week, he joined Graff-Radford at Discussions, the company’s London customer event. It marked the beginning of a broader listening tour with Discuss customers to hear directly from research and insights teams about how they’re adapting to AI.
“Research is at an inflection point,” said Williams. “AI is prompting us to reexamine everything from sampling and collection methods to analysis, understanding, and decision systems. I see twin opportunities for researchers: accelerating existing ways of working and expanding the breadth and depth of what we can do with fierce rigor. What drew me to Discuss is the platform itself and its ability to innovate on both.”
“Rich human understanding requires deep research expertise and a suite of capabilities,” Williams added. “Discuss brings a rare combination of quantitative, qualitative and interpretive intelligence at scale, engineered for where the industry is headed. The future is about more than speed. It’s about permanence of impact, making research a consequential part of every organizational decision.”
For Discuss customers, the appointment provides a direct line to a research leader who built and led insights functions within global enterprises and is joining a platform designed to combine AI and human-led research rather than force a choice between them.
“AI is reshaping research, and we have been reshaping Discuss to meet it. Hiring Luke was about finding a partner who already sees where this is going,” said Daniel Graff-Radford, CEO of Discuss. “He knows how to combine our AI-enabled platform with our customers’ own research so that insights leaders move from supporting decisions to guiding them.”
Frequently Asked Questions
Who is Luke Williams? Luke Williams is Discuss’ chief research officer, effective Sept. 14, 2026. He most recently served as Chief Customer Experience and Research Officer at Press Ganey Forsta and previously held research and customer experience leadership roles at Microsoft, Qualtrics, AECOM and Ipsos.
What does the chief research officer do at Discuss? Williams works across Discuss’ product, customer and go-to-market teams, shaping the company’s research strategy and its point of view on how AI and human expertise work together in research.
What books has Luke Williams written? Williams is the co-author of the New York Times and USA Today bestseller “The Wallet Allocation Rule” (Wiley, 2015) and of the Nielsen Bookscan bestseller “Why Loyalty Matters” (Benbella, 2009), both with Timothy Keiningham, Lerzan Aksoy and Alexander Buoye.
Why did Discuss create a chief research officer role? Discuss created the role to operate across leadership, product, customer and go-to-market organizations, bringing the perspective of a researcher, enterprise practitioner and industry thought leader to the company’s strategy. His early priorities include continued customer immersion, advancing Discuss’ research point of view and helping organizations navigate how human expertise and AI can work together to produce research that is faster, more scalable and more consequential.
About Discuss
Discuss is a global qualitative and quantitative market research platform that combines AI interviews with human-moderated research. A Forrester Wave Leader for Experience Research Platforms, Q1 2026, Discuss enables insights and marketing teams worldwide to conduct live and asynchronous research at scale while applying the human judgment that makes findings actionable. Unlike AI-only research tools, Discuss integrates AI moderation, live human moderation, and advanced analytics in a single platform. Learn more at discuss.io.
Media Contact: pr@discuss.io
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