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Research can also be a great tool for businesses seeking information to help improve. In First Break All the Rules by Marcus Buckingham and Curt Coffman (Simon & Schuster, 1999) and Good to Great by Jim Collins (HarperCollins, 2001), the authors conducted some serious research on business performance improvement. Collins had a team of researchers sort through the performance histories of nearly 1,500 companies and Buckingham and Coffman used more than 80,000 interview results from 25 years of research done by the Gallup Organization. The authors used their results to come up with concepts and theories for organizational development. Their ideas were born from their research and many businesses benefitted from it.

But this halo effect causes some to believe that they should partake in research or at least follow the principles used in research. Just because there has been very good use of research, it doesn't mean that a business should try to replicate these efforts, especially not for practical application.

It's important not to ignore or forget all of the failed attempts at innovation, all of the research that proved not to be useful, and all of the results that led researchers down the wrong paths.

Many leaders use examples of others' success to push them to try a new idea. They cherish books like In Search of Excellence by Tom Peters and Robert Waterman (Warner Books, 1982), where success stories fill the pages.

Most leaders want to see metrics that others are using. They don't want to undertake a venture without proven success from similar organizations or competitors—to some degree ensuring that they are never in the lead or on the cutting edge. This aversion to risk-taking was addressed in more detail in chapter 13 on benchmarking.

Research can be a very good thing. But most organizations really can't afford to conduct non-directed research (that is, any research not directly related to product development). It is not that research is bad—it's simply too costly in terms of time and expense.

Can you afford to perform non-directed research?

The Cost of Research

Research involves gathering data using interviews, surveys, observations, experimentation, documentation and instrumentation. Research involves a lot of time to gather the data; not only the researcher's time, but the time of those providing the information. Experiments take time, especially when you consider the need for control groups and double-blind techniques.

You can't afford to create metrics without a purpose. You can't afford to gather data, create measures, and compile information without a direction for it. You can't afford to build a structure and hope that later someone will come to fill it or use it.

So you may be thinking, “But I never wanted to do research and I doubt that my company will ever want to do research!”

Although you may not want to do it, I assure you that you'll end up doing research.

If you are collecting analyzing, and reporting data without a root question, you're performing non-directed research.

Research in Disguise

A common task assigned to a metrics analyst by well-meaning management is to come up with some “interesting” data. Basically, the leader is admitting he doesn't know what he wants, but he is willing for you to take the time and effort to try and come up with something he likes. Like Justice Potter Stewart's assertion regarding pornography, he'd know it when he saw it.

Management wrongly believes that the right metrics, the metrics they want, will be revealed through just a bit of trial and error. If you simply collect enough information, management will be able to separate the wheat from the chaff.

To satisfy a request to go out and find some useful, interesting measures, you can:

Examine existing products

Read books on your industry and the processes involved

Ask a lot of industry experts about their opinions and experiences

Study how processes are carried out

Choose from any one of the many research tools