Mpho Mpofu

Mpho Mpofu is the founder and CEO of Masutane, a specialist qualitative research and consumer insights consultancy based in Johannesburg, working across African and global markets. Over more than two decades she has led qualitative work across consumer goods, financial services, and retail for brands operating on the continent and internationally, with fieldwork spanning West, East and Southern Africa. The work runs from the boardroom to the township, and the value sits in the cultural fluency that comes from understanding African consumers from the inside. Much of Mpho’s work has been about building the field around her.

She founded the Masutane Academy, a five-year programme that trained a generation of emerging African researchers. She has spent years training moderators and coaching clients on moderation and qualitative research. She is also deeply passionate and invested in equipping entrepreneurs with research knowledge and resources for the success of their businesses. Alongside this she runs The Qual Collab, an annual gathering that brings the continent’s qualitative community into one room. She is a longstanding voice in industry bodies and a recipient of QRCA’s Global Qualitative Researchers’ Grant.

Mpho believes African qualitative research is its own discipline, built over decades by practitioners working where methodology has to bend to the room and the language in front of you. That experience belongs to the people who worked for it. Her work keeps coming back to making sure it gets recorded and led from the continent itself.