Connections Over Capability

 So, someone at my old company was just promoted to VP of Operations. Sounds great, right? Well, it sounds great until you realize that this person has no operations experience. Not just no operations experience with that specific company, but no operations experience at all. 

Sadly, this is true to form for that organization. Since I left:

ChatGPT or Insanity

One of the reasons I was eager to set up this blog is that I ran into a paper the other day and it absolutely left me dumbfounded. . . or in a more Archie McNally turn of phrase, . . . found me dumb.

The assignment is to peer review one of our classmates' papers. The paper happens to be on our personal philosophy of inquiry as it pertains to qualitative research, and specifically, qualitative research frameworks. Already, as you can tell, this is fairly heady stuff. These are not easy-to-read papers. BUT, when I read this classmate's paper, . . speechless. 

IRB-Less Pub

 I started my own IRB last summer. Why? Well, I was tired of latching on to different universities. Every time I used K-State's IRB, I had to rope in Dr. K. And every time I published, since he didn't do anything more than latch onto my IRB, I never included him as an author. It felt weird. 

Texas A&M's IRB process took months to complete. That was one good thing about K-State's. It usually takes less than a week. 

Recommitting to Daily

I'm going to start daily writing here again . . . Why? Well, for several reasons. 

1) I do better with daily activities in my life. I saw my son working on his sit-ups the other night, and I remembered that when I was his age, I had a daily goal of 100. Every night before I went to bed, I had to complete 100 sit-ups. It could be 3 sets of 30 with a kicker of 10 at the end. It could be all in one go. It could be 200 one night, then skip the next time. But, there had to be 100 a night. I think I did that all throughout high school. When I joined the Army, I maxed out the sit-up portion of the PT test. 

Not Sure This Counts

I'm not sure if this counts or not, but I'm posting this anyway. I found myself in BIC again (HERE).

This is an instance of un-earned media . . . or earned media, depending on who you ask. What's that you ask? Well, the definition would be: publicity or exposure gained without paid advertising or direct promotion by the company. It is media attention or coverage that a brand receives organically, through word of mouth, news coverage, customer reviews, social media shares, or viral content.

Safety Publication

In my scholarly writing class, our professor said that our goal should be to publish five peer-reviewed academic articles from the results of our dissertations. Our dissertations should be unique and distinct, but there should be enough data to parse the results in a way to develop four or five other articles. 

I published one that focuses on VR vs Non-VR training in Research in Learning Technologies (HERE). I just had a second published, this one was focused on qualitative interview responses from my dissertation participants (HERE). Well, today, I was able to get a third published (HERE).

Second One for this Series

We released the second in a our series of studies on Women in Construction (HERE). This one I wrote solo. It is VERY dry. It has a "just the facts, ma'am" appeal to it,  . . . quite intentionally. For each project, I intend to have an editorial article, a research report (like this one), and at least one white paper. 

This research report is a very basic statement of the facts of the survey. "It shows this, and it shows this, oh and also it shows this," on and on and on. It draws very few conclusions, in fact. I actually had to work to not make it more substantive. The more substantive conclusions will come with the white papers. 

WIC Research Report

I completed my first research report. Since taking this new position, I've been thrilled that someone is actually paying me just to write. In my position and role, my job is to produce research reports, white papers, academic journal articles, etc. Unlike my previous role, I'm not burdened by other managerial duties and innovation challenges. Just write, write, write. 

We produced our first research report, this one on Women in construction (HERE). I co-authored this one with a training group called Ambition Theory. 

Adult Learning Again

I know that book reviews aren't the best way to increase your publication list, but it's a way. And I intend to take full advantage of that way (and as many others as possible).

I still remember one of my professors talking about this route to publication. She was on the editorial board of Adult Learning and knew that they needed more book reviewers. It was just a few weeks later that I talked to my study buddy about how we might go about finding books that need to be reviewed. We didn't have any very good solutions. 

First Qualitative Publication

During the midst of my dissertation study, I took a moment to interview a few of the participants. We had almost 2000 participants in my study, but two days in August, I set up a table outside the VR stations and asked about 10 of them, individually, to sit with me for a few minutes and tell me about their experiences. 

Each interview took about 15 to 20 minutes, and it was random in that I didn't pre-screen or designate who I would talk to. I just took the first 10 or so who showed up. The results were very interesting. So interesting, in fact, that I decided to write them up for a qualitative article (HERE).