Since my last update (October 28), my field research project has completed its most labor intensive phase. Phase 1 (Call For Participation) took about a month elapsed time (August 15 thru September 15). The focus of Phase 1 was to layout the project scope, construct the contextual research framework and finalize the list of participating organizations. Phase 2 (Interviews & Consolidation) took longer - about two months (September 15 through November 20). During that time I was on the road for around 40 days. The focus of Phase 2 was pretty labor intensive (refer to my prior update for some stats). Each interview session lasted an average of 90 minutes and produced a long set of handwritten notes (usually between 10-15 pages). After each interview session, an internal "interpretation session" with other analysts resulted in an "affinity statement" that summarized key points and finding from the interview. Affinity statements seemed to average around 60 line items. Phase 2 culminated with a "consolidation session" last week in Chicago which included 4 other analysts. For the consolidation session, each affinity statement is broken down into an individual line item as a "post-it note". While the complete affinity statement reflects the perspective of a single organization, during the consolidation session we are looking for horizontal patterns across all the individual data points regardless of organization. Breaking the affinity statements down into individual items allowed us to do a bottom-up sorting of the information into clusters that we could then organize into categories. These categories could then be further abstracted into a narrative of what is going on within organizations concerning social networks. The result was a wall covered with 35-40 sheets of flip chart paper with the 1700 post-it notes taped down into a hierarchy of sorts. The approach we applied (based on contextual design/inquiry) really does enable you to find commonalities across organizations and identify unique insights by letting the data "speak for itself".
Phase 3 should be more normal (in terms of time, labor, etc). Phase 3 involves deeper analysts of the information in order to write a research document. Originally I thought that the project would result in the normal 50 page Burton Group report. What we discovered is that we have so much data that a single document cannot address all the areas touched upon by participating organizations. Instead, I'll be writing a series of shorter documents (around 15 pages each) that will follow the storyline we created during the consolidation session last week. For those organizations that participated - there's no change - you will receive the "report" (whether you are a client or not) as a set rather than a single file, and you will still have the opportunity to discuss the findings as originally promised. It's just an incredible amount of data to wade through and I don't want to reduce the value of the information by arbitrarily cutting it short (in terms of a single report).
As of today, the flip chart pages with the post-it notes are on their way to my home office. Once I get them up on the walls here (to the joy of my family who might not appreciate the new wallpaper downstairs in our cellar), I'll pass along some additional insight. Unfortunately, in order to meet my deliverable deadlines I've had to pass on attending Cisco's C-Scape (December) and IBM's Lotusphere (January) events. This has been an exhausting journey but I should be getting back to a more normal routine over the next few weeks - including posting on a more regular basis.
Hey Mike, this is one of the blogs I follow occasionally (I'll be more diligent going forward). It was interesting to see how the project has evolved. Looking forward to the results.
Posted by: Tim Gray | November 27, 2008 at 08:47 AM