We Don't Do Duvets

Over the past couple of years, I’ve often been asked to do desk research. And often my initial (and purely internal) reaction has been unenthusiastic. But it’s also something that I’ve done a lot of just lately, and done pretty successfully at that. So what’s the hesitation? Why do I instinctively worry?

I think it’s because there’s less control with desk research. If you’re designing a survey or focus groups, you know the outcome you want, and you can design questions to help you understand that. You might fund that your audience doesn’t have the answers, but you’ll have all of the data/reasons for why that is. You’ll get a complete picture.

With desk research, you don’t have that control. What you can find will depend on what’s been done, what’s been published and what’s available. The exact answer you want may simply not be there.

And I maybe worry that people don’t value it as much. They view desk research as “How good at Google are you?” And, of course, there’s some truth in there, but it’s more like “How persistent at Google are you?” For every source you report there are 10 others that looked good, but offered nothing. But I know where to find good demographics, salary, competitor employer information, so experience plays its part too.

My increasing comfort with desk is a realisation that it’s just the same as the other qual and quant. It’s all about telling a story. (And ideally it’s about shaping that story in advance, so that we report on what we know we can know). A story of what you were able to discover, of what isn’t available, of what the absence tells you. A story of what you can know AND what you can infer. Because that way – like with all research – you start to elevate through Data-Insight-Knowledge-Wisdom. And that’s where it has value. And that’s where I start to get enthusiastic about the work!

Procrastination

It’s insidious, isn’t it? You have the best of intentions, then it gets you – and half an hour’s gone by. Well, with no paid work today, it seems like a good day to blog about it. Because on a day like this I’ll worry that I’m not getting anything done. And the truth is that most days I worry that I’m not getting enough done, or that I’m not doing it fast or attentively enough.

Why is that? I’ve never (at time of publishing…) had the feedback “Did that really take you all day?” or “Is that it?!” Yes, I’ll get feedback and extra requests and – normally - I take that with a smile. My clients seem more than happy with what I produce and how I produce it.

So why this nagging doubt? In part, it’s because I undoubtedly do my best work when I’m up against it. There’s something about pressure or volume that puts my brain into an active, focussed state. I work quickly, creatively and I see the gaps. It’s not always comfortable, but it’s effective. On the other hand, give me a day to do a half-day job, and at about 5 o’clock I’ll realise I’ve missed the blindingly obvious. So am I creating my own pressure by wasting half the day? Or with that much space in the day is the lure of the web just too strong?

Broadly, there’s two things you can do about procrastination. You can tackle it head on: http://www.fastcompany.com/3008359/3-ways-tackle-your-procrastination-problem?partner=newsletter

Or you can use it more like a way of taking a long run-up to getting going: http://hackerspace.lifehacker.com/how-procrastination-can-become-a-productive-activity-1440113157

Me? I’m probably more of the latter. I’ve always got a list of things that I can usefully do that isn’t paid work: so that’s admin and finances, that’s new business, that’s reading article and blogs, that’s researching new tools and methods AND it’s some life admin too. It’s teaching myself touch-typing (although that in turn is getting thoroughly procrastinated right now). And at times it’s telling myself I have to complete a section, or work to a time before I check again on Surrey’s latest doomed attempt to win a four-day game.

How do you overcome the urge to waste your own time?

More of Tom Gauld’s excellent cartoons here: http://myjetpack.tumblr.com/

“That’s a stupid question”

As someone who designs questions for research, that’s not really what I want to hear. But I do. And sometimes expressed in more forceful terms than this too.

Most of the time, it’s in surveys. I can chalk it off as the reaction of someone who is too short on time to give a considered answer. But just occasionally, I’ve had it in focus groups or interviews. And then you have to ask whether the question you’ve written is as accessible as it should be? Does it make sense to the person you’re asking it of? What help do they need to break down how they feel about their employer into more manageable chunks?

In a focus group or interview, you’ve got the chance to qualify the question and help people into it. In a survey they’re on their own, so you have to be careful. So let’s look at a current question from Linked In’s Inspiration Index: http://lnkd.in/ii_nus. It’s a single question: “How often do you feel inspired by your work?” And it has some issues, that I’m sure they must have considered carefully:

• “Inspired”: is that the right word? We can see why they avoid “engaged”- that’s too hard to define. But why not “happy” or “satisfied”?
•  “Inspired”: what do they mean? Those days when you genuinely feel the love for your boss, your clients and your work? Or just the days when you “get it”?
• “Inspired”: does it matter? Do you need to be inspired in your work, any more than you need to be inspired when you’re socialising, being a parent, or just doing the dishes?
• The rating system. There’s a sliding scale from “Never feel inspired” to “Always feel inspired”, with no points in between. How does my shifting the slider “a bit” compare to the next man’s?
• The rating system. There’s no control, or comparison. It’s an absolute scale, but no definition of what, say, 73% means.
•  The timing. What’s happened that morning is likely to have an effect on my response. Will I be asked again?

But honestly, I don’t think it’s a stupid question because, what they’re looking to find out is clear enough. They’ve gone for one question to maximise response at the expense of detail, but they know a lot about the people responding anyway. In aggregate - and there’s over 100,000 responses already - the data will become fairly reliable. Potential problems with the rating system and timing will likely be ironed out in the bell-curve. And there’s standard practice to deal with the bulk response and the outliers. 

What I am saying is that even to design a one-question survey, you need to consider a lot of things. So get someone who does it a lot to help you.

Big Data? What Data?

I’ve been thinking a lot about Big Data of late. It’s hard not to. Many people believe it’s the answer to a lot of problems. And as a researcher who likes getting his hands on a bunch of stats, people have expected me to have an opinion.

Reading this this CIPD report made me think I ought to think about more my thoughts. Because what’s been running round my head is “What data?” I perfectly can see how a retailer has all the transactional data. And especially if they have loyalty schemes / log-ins, they can look at that by type of customer, by region, against historical data, by types of product etc etc. There’s lots of hard data, and there’s lots of ways to cut it. The other trope that’s routinely reeled off is Moneyball. Baseball is a stats driven sport, with every aspect of the game being readily quantified against the opposition, stage of game, against left-right handers etc etc

What I haven’t been convinced of, and haven’t been by this report, is that there’s an analogy to working life. The report suggests three types of data: people data (demographics, skills, reward, engagement etc), programme data (attendance, adoption, participation in programmes and key projects and assignments) performance data (performance ratings and data captured from 360, goal attainment, talent, succession programmes and talent and assessment). And for me, right there is the problem. There may be data, but it is not automatically captured – there isn’t that retail or baseball analogy.

Much of that data has to assessed, possibly with some subjective judgements. And even if it’s purely objective, it will depend on the skill of the manager and/or the arsedness of the employee to get it right. It’s a massive leap from where we are now to the assertion that “Generally it is felt that HR data will be revolutionised by big data.”

Right now, I don’t think there’s really good data. By all means try and create it - there would be fantastic value. But for now, let’s look at what we can reliably and more easily measure, and let’s include staff surveys of all types in there. Then let’s use that as a pointer to the conversations you should be having with employees to understand what matters to them and how you can make the greatest difference to them and their ability to serve your customers.

Making it personal

In my last blog, I made the case for simplicity. But, people* say to me, doesn’t mean that you are applying simplistic, one-size-fits-all solutions? No, I retort, not a bit of it, glad that they’ve raised this very issue, as it gives me the opportunity to talk about my approach to research. Again.

Yes, looking for the simplest, biggest picture is a guiding principle of mine. I want to look for the fewest actions that will have the biggest effect on the most people. But the detail of how you do that is crucial.

And that’s where research comes into its own. Specifically the qualitative. Any quantitative that you have done will serve to point you in the right directions. But it is by talking to people, in depth, that you will get to the core of the issue. It is them who will help you to understand what works well, and what can be improved, and suggest what may be introduced.

By asking the open questions that you simply can’t do otherwise, you’ll see where issues are - they’ll be front of mind. But you also see where issue aren’t, what is obviously already satisfactory, or just off-the radar. Dig further into what you uncover and you’re understanding not just, say, that communication is an issue, but whether it’s about frequency, channels, transparency, tone, attitudes, or whatever.

So too, it’s only by speaking to the people in the organisation that you will start to uncover the culture of the business and what works well there. How and why are people most inspired and persuaded? What improves the chances of engaging them and enabling them to perform? 

I want to work with people to find recommendations by them and for them. I do want those simple solutions, but I want ones that absolutely fit the business that they are designed for.

* By “people”, I mostly mean the conversations I’m conducting with myself…