What is “Research?”

Allow me to go out on a limb and assume that you and I have at least two things in common:

• We are not professional actors (maybe you are?)
• We are not in Leonardo DiCaprio’s inner circle

I haven’t gone through the process of an actor in preparing for a role and I haven’t talked to Leo about it. However, from what I understand, there’s some research involved. Research!? Awesome!

Now, take a second to speculate with me:

• What input did Leo seek to prepare for his role in The Wolf of Wall Street?
• What methods did he use to gather this input to shape such a powerful and provocative performance?

Take a guess. Name a few things if you want.

Got ‘em? Good.

Let me guess. You may have imagined Leo doing things like:

• Talking to Jordan Belfort about his life and decisions
• Going to places that Jordan went, immersing in his lifestyle
• Talking to people that knew Jordan during that period in his life

Those are pretty good guesses. You probably did NOT imagine Leo pouring over reports of Stratton Oakfield’s trade volume or running analyses on the number of incoming and outgoing calls he received week to week. And why not? Because that particular data is not useful to Leo’s specific job (but it could be useful for someone else, for some other purpose.)

What are you getting at?

The moral of the story is that there are a variety of reasons for doing research, and a variety of methods for collecting information to help inform your research goals.

Within industry cohorts, “Research” is used as shorthand for the collection of facts that will inform work and decision-making within their realm of expertise. Every practice holds strong perspectives on how to do research, what good research is, and how research should be applied.

But the word “Research,” on it’s own, does a poor job of articulating your goals on a cross-disciplinary team. This is why modifiers like “market,” “design,” and “ethnographic” are critically important.

Say more…

Imagine a scientist, a marketer, a designer, and an ethnographer collaborating on a project. Let’s say that they all agree that the first step is a “Research” phase to lay a foundation for the project. They step away to do their individual planning, and when they come back, they share very different strategies.

The scientist needs to prove or disprove the team’s underlying hypothesis about how the human brain works. They prepare a scientific research protocol to be performed with hundreds (or thousands) of research subjects. The intention of the study is to specifically prove or disprove a singular hypothesis about how subjects will respond to the specific stimulus delivered through the study.

Designers are most excited by design research because they find it actionable, just like businesses are most excited by market research because they find it actionable.

The marketer needs tools to define a marketing strategy to monetize the product and forecast revenue. They prepare a market research protocol to gather quantitative sizing data around target demographics (age, location, gender, race, income) to shape market segments, and to map certain measurable behaviors or mindsets (shop at certain stores, commute by car, etc.) to each segment.

The designer needs to understand what special value the product can deliver and how properly to articulate that value through an interaction with the product or service. They prepare a design research program to understand perceived value and attitude around alternative products, and qualitatively frame differentiation in terms of the value a new product or feature could provide.

The ethnographer needs to understand the behaviors and cultural factors that surround this domain. They prepare an ethnographic research program to identify and explain patterns of behavior and external factors and trends that might impact these behaviors.

Each discipline is focused on different goals, and therefore requires different methodologies and approaches.

So where’s the problem?

Businesses place strong value on market research (as they should) because it helps them to model potential revenue and promotional expenses associated with new products and services. In the domain of business, market research is often simply referred to as “Research” as this is the information that they find most actionable. Market Research is also the type of research capability most likely to be represented internally within a business. For people working in business, there is significant value bias toward market research over any other.

As for the other three disciplines, business is often the key patron that makes their work possible. Businesses commission the expertise of scientists, designers, ethnographers, and other professionals to support specific business objectives.

Within science and ethnography, “Research” is generally accepted as a pursuit of fundamental knowledge due to the longstanding history of academic rigor in those areas. Businesses may be tempted to believe that they have sufficient knowledge to move forward without additional input from these disciplines, and therefore, may be less likely to engage these practitioners unless they realize their business depends on it.

Design services, on the other hand, are actively sought by businesses for the creation of things to be manufactured and monetized: a critical function to many businesses. Designers rely on research as part of their process to understand what will make a product successful, but their discipline is much better known for their ability to generate these outcomes, and not for the research that informs them.

Businesses too frequently dismiss the importance of design research as a separate endeavor from market research. And here’s where it get’s problematic.

The conversation might go something like this:

This is a parody, of course. My goal with this post is to highlight the difference between different types of research and to encourage respectful conversations around the goals and processes of people from other disciplines.

Thankfully, few businesses that we work with are dismissive of the value of qualitative design research as illustrated above, but not all businesses are so enlightened. On the flip side, many designers are not enlightened to the value of market research and can be equally dismissive of these important business artifacts.

Further, designers should be aware that the details of Design Research are not always as compelling to business audiences as they are to you. Designers are most excited by design research because they find it actionable, just like businesses are most excited by market research because they find it actionable. The goal is the same for designers, businesses, scientists, ethnographers, and even for Leonardo DiCaprio. Do the research that informs your practice.

Originally published at momentdesign.com.