[Sigia-l] research: when is it enough?

[Lyle_Kantrovich at cargill.com]

Ziya,

Clearly you've never run into any problem you can't solve based on your 
own "wisdom" -- and because you are omniscient, your opinion is valued 
above all others including seasoned business leaders with a track 
record of making businesses profitable (and who get paid 5 times what 
you do).  Your genius and infallible nature are obvious to everyone who 
meets you.

You must either be God or Bill Gates.  :-)

But seriously, even the most powerful and revered people on the planet 
need to be diplomats, negotiators, and salespeople occasionally.  Some 
of the greatest minds in history spent a lot of time doing research and 
learning from the research of others.  Published research findings 
aren't a "crutch", but rather lessons learned by others and shared for 
your benefit. Research (the activity) is the homework you need to do to 
make sure your design decisions (based on "wisdom") aren't really 
"hunches".  "Wisdom" and published research (shared wisdom) both get 
outdated eventually if not refreshed and validated.  

Since I'm not in the category of "most powerful and revered people on 
the planet", I have to be even a bit more humble in my approach to 
project stakeholders -- especially when my family's livihood depends on 
it.  To answer PeterV's original (and very good) question: 

When it comes to my own research on design projects, I take the 
engineering approach and do as much as is feasible give the project 
constraints.  When it comes to research from others I look for much 
more rigor and (hopefully) third-party validation.  Boyd de Groot 
summarized this well in his post.

I do one type of rudimentary research when I read this list every day.  
Thanks to all who help this list to be (usually) a high 
signal-to-noise-ratio resource.

Regards,

Lyle Kantrovich
User Experience Architect
Cargill
http://www.cargill.com/

Personal Web Log:
http://crocolyle.blogspot.com/
Commentary on usability, information architecture and web design.

Boxes and Arrows Article: CHI 2002-Changing the world, changing 
ourselves 
http://www.boxesandarrows.com/archives/002603.php


-----Original Message-----
From: ZiyaOz at earthlink.net [mailto:ZiyaOz at earthlink.net]
Sent: Monday, May 06, 2002 3:34 PM
To: sigia-l at asis.org
Subject: Re: [Sigia-l] research: when is it enough?


"Fiorito, David" wrote:

> The management where I work _does_ trust my opinion specifically 
because I
> was able to demonstrate the validity of my opinions and did so 
consistently
> over time.  

OK, good. So you don't need the 'research' crutch any longer. Problem
solved.

> Now when I present a hunch people listen.

'Hunch'? Since when experience and professional wisdom considered a 
'hunch'?
What's next, coin-operated website builders and dial-in UI wizards?

Best,

Ziya

Content Management Symposium, Chicago O'Hare Marriott, June 28 - 30.
See http://www.asis.org/CM
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