This is a thought piece on research. This was presented to students studying for a Masters in Advertising and Design at the University of Leeds.

1. What is Research?

2. Today
Introduction
My POV
Discussion & questions

3. Today
Introduction
My POV
Discussion & questions

4. Introducing Me
Alumni *Planner
Filmmaker /
Photographer
Qualitative
Researcher
*Strategist

5. Qualitative Research
Interviews Surveys
Group
Sessions
Day
Immersions
It's people focused, not numbers focused (although they can help)

6. It’s the study of people, culture, and business.

11. My experience
Airlines
Financial services
Sports apparel
Fashion
Beer
Diapers
Today

12. Introducing you
Research Strategy Creative
Start of year Final output

13. Introducing you
Research Strategy Creative
Start of year Final output

14. People Competition
The problem The insight The outcome
• A position…
• A Proposition…
• A Plan…
Business
Human Culture
Strategy

15. –Jaap Van Oirschot - Strategy Director @Mr. Fox Agency
"It is getting clarity on the human problem behind the business"

16. Introducing you
Research Strategy Creative
Start of year Final output

17. Today
Introduction
My POV
Discussion & questions

18. What is Research?
Questions Good People Systems Documenting

19. What is Research?
Questions Good People Systems Documenting

20. Questions posed from many places, from clients, teachers, and within.
About asking yourself whether these questions are the right questions.
The world you will offer you questions which are leading.
And a leading question is pointing people to an answer.
Our job is to provoke the reveal of something we don't know.
Questions

21. –Sönke Ahrens - “How To Take Smart Notes”
“While we should seek out dis-confirming arguments and facts that
challenge our way of thinking, we are naturally drawn to everything
that makes us feel good, which is everything that confirms what we
already believe we know.”

22. Questions should flow naturally from one to next.
They should warm up the deepest curiosities of our subject.
There must be an ongoing reviewal of the questions we are asking.
“Are these questions merely reconfirming what you already know?”
“Are these questions creating clarity or confusion?”
Questions

23. Sometimes we might be involved because we know nothing of a subject.
This gives us permission to ask questions no one else will, or that they are
blind to.
Sometimes we will be involved because we are knowledgeable on a
matter and can asked sharper questions.
Regardless, don't never assume you know.
Questions

24. Lastly, questions are followed by a long (possibly uncomfortable) silence.
We wait because this is where truths are revealed.
Questions

25. Insure you have a bank of questions always, beyond the needs of right now.
Physical or digital, a place where you note your most burning thoughts.
Questions

26. –Richard Feynman, Physicist
(aka the “Great Explainer”)
“You have to keep a dozen of your favorite problems
constantly present in your mind, although by and large
they will lay in a dormant state. Every time you hear or
read a new trick or a new result, test it against each of
your twelve problems to see whether it helps. Every
once in a while there will be a hit”

27. "What is Research?" is a question I'm sharing with you now.
"Why do research?"
"Why do research, how to do it, and what does it look like?"
"What is research and how can I make a difference?"
"What is research and why can it make a difference?”
Questions

28. Research is a question.

29. What is Research?
Questions Good People Systems Documenting

30. We engage the people* to whom these question matters most.
*Stakeholders, Customers, Audience, Consumers, Mindset etc etc.
Their opinions and their beliefs might be different from ours, that’s ok.
This is not about you even when it feels like it is.
Good People

31. It can be explaining something to your mum,
Discussing a burning question with your friends or neighbour.
But it also goes beyond recruiting our kind of people.
For otherwise this would be quick and dirty research.
Good People

32. Good people are more knowledgeable than you, who are connected to your
research questions (loosely and directly).
Athletes, Professors, School Chefs, Police Officers, Writers, Technologists,
Designers, Photographers, and Prostitutes.
Good People

33. –Rob Campbell, Soon-to-be-Chief Strategy Officer at Colenso BBDO
(aka the “Opinionated Sod”)
“I am a huge believer in informants. The more the merrier.
They should absolutely NOT come from the industry, they should be
people who have a connection to ‘real life’ and be in a position to be
able to voice an opinion because of their position.”

34. Research is good people.

35. What is Research?
Questions Good People Systems Documenting

36. Systems help us optimise how we learn as people.
They bring about process that respects the limitations of our brain.
Systems integrate smartly with technology.
They embrace healthy living and work environments.
Systems frees up humans to be more human.
Systems

37. Systems facilitate our own productivity.
They foster good ideas:
“Does this idea need more time, more exploration?”
“What did we learn from our mistakes?”
Systems

38. Lastly, research should include a system of methodologies.
Systems

39. Building A Second Brain
Roam Research
Readwise

40. Research is a system

41. What is Research?
Questions Good People Systems Documenting

42. Research requires that we document the noteworthy.
It is not the manual documentation of everything (as stated before,
technology can help u with that).
We must package our notes to a future self.
Documenting

43. Stop and check yourself.
Are you typing every word I say right now or are you actively listening?
Are you hoping to write it all down and study it later?
What does my choice of words invoke within you?
To Document

44. –Me
“A ‘note’ is not a verbatim record of what must be remembered, but a
reconstruction and elaboration of knowledge itself, laced with meaning and
personal understanding.”

45. Research should always document real world experience.
It's the making of things: films, portraits, mood boards, maps, and playlists.
It is the nuance in what is shared and what is not.
Documenting

46. Lastly, and most unromantically, it’s the backing up of all your efforts.
Documenting

47. Research is to document
Link

48. What is Research?
Questions Good People Systems Documenting

49. What is Research?
The depth that
shapes the questions
we wish to ask
ourselves and others.
The type of people
who will bring new
light to our growing
body of knowledge.
The concious systems
that get the best out of
ourselves and others.
The art of how we
capture and bring
insight to life.
Questions Good People Systems Documenting

50. A Question Good People A System To Document
What is Research for you?

51. What does it become?
Research Strategy Creative
Start of year Final output

52. Today
Introduction
My POV
Discussion & questions

53. Thank You
@benculpin