No Research Is No Excuse

November 8, 2009 by  

I recently participated in a study in at Harvard. It was about emotion, cognition and aging. I wasn’t particularly impressed with the experiment and the methodology but found the follow-up interview valuable in that it validated my own work. The interviewer was not only surprised about my grasp of concepts like emotional and cognitive embodiment, but that I’d integrated them in my methodologies and blog and had conceived them through my personal and professional experience and development as well as my auto-didactic learning and training.

One of the criticisms creative professional service providers get is about the supposed difficulties of being in the same space as those who have the hard research to back up their theories.

So here’s the thing.

  • If your ideas, solutions and content are unique, forward-thinking and deep, then there’s a high probability that there’s a lot of current research available in the public domain to validate them. So use it.
  • If the research in any way contradicts your fabulous ideas, solutions and content, well there’s a great point of differentiation and positioning for you.
  • If the research is non-existent or in a nascent stage, and you think its important to moving your work forward, then you can apply for a grant.

Post to Twitter

Filed under: Cognition, Creativity, going solo, Professional Services, qualitative research, self-awareness, solo psf
Tagged:
Comments: None