Today's daily blog faffing brings news that several executives from the second and final case site for my data collection have been dismissed in a less than positive fashion. Unfortunately, this probably includes at least six people from my target list. I believe Charlie Brown put it best as Lucy - yet again - pulled the football away from him at the last possible moment: "AUGHHH!"
Who knows what this will do for my data collection efforts? So far, I have conducted a mere seven of the approximately 30 interviews that I want to get for that case, with three more scheduled over the next couple of weeks. One of the interviewees from this week will be the one who 'broke' the story over the blog, so he may be a possible intermediary to get in touch with some of the folks who have been dismissed. I can also contact the old CEO (who has become perhaps the wealthiest house DJ in the world) or the old COO to see if one of them can introduce me.
If neither works and I am forced to go over to another case site, I have a site in mind, but there is little chance of me getting in contact with 30 people soon enough to get sufficient data to prove my case. Then I will be forced to discuss things like having one main case and two mini-cases in support of the main case (a la Leonard-Barton 1989).
Oh well...I didn't want a publishable dissertation anyway.
Showing posts with label planning. Show all posts
Showing posts with label planning. Show all posts
Sunday, January 14, 2007
Sunday, January 07, 2007
One at a time, dude
I have made a little progress on my dissertation in that I have scheduled a few more interviews on my second site, three of which promise to be very, very interesting. However, I had also hoped to get eight more interviews but the people have not responded to me. I am having to learn to be patient. I will also have to learn to play the connections from the other end - through personal introductions rather than through trying to make the connections myself.
I have not done any new coding/analysis passes though. Unfortunately life has been extra busy. Today we did a science project for my son. The data and analysis was pretty well done (not precisely enough for 'real science' but probably good enough for a fourth grade project), but I fear that he will not be able to get an acceptable conclusion out of it. Oh well - he may not win, but at least he has a good idea about scientific method.
Also, the car has a major anti-freeze leak that will demand attention (and money) on Monday, so there goes that day. Tuesday, I have a meeting with Maric but I need to read/write a bit before then. I also need to try to get those other interviews scheduled. Add to that the fact that I am having a few more aches and pains than normal (getting old) and I need to address some critical financial issues, and voila' - I am covered up with stuff to do and I am stressed out! How in the hell am I going to finish this dissertation without killing myself?!
Answer: One at a time.
One day at a time, one interview at a time, one transcription at a time, one coding pass at a time, one word at a time, one page at a time, one section at a time, one chapter at a time.
One at a time.
I have not done any new coding/analysis passes though. Unfortunately life has been extra busy. Today we did a science project for my son. The data and analysis was pretty well done (not precisely enough for 'real science' but probably good enough for a fourth grade project), but I fear that he will not be able to get an acceptable conclusion out of it. Oh well - he may not win, but at least he has a good idea about scientific method.
Also, the car has a major anti-freeze leak that will demand attention (and money) on Monday, so there goes that day. Tuesday, I have a meeting with Maric but I need to read/write a bit before then. I also need to try to get those other interviews scheduled. Add to that the fact that I am having a few more aches and pains than normal (getting old) and I need to address some critical financial issues, and voila' - I am covered up with stuff to do and I am stressed out! How in the hell am I going to finish this dissertation without killing myself?!
Answer: One at a time.
One day at a time, one interview at a time, one transcription at a time, one coding pass at a time, one word at a time, one page at a time, one section at a time, one chapter at a time.
One at a time.
Monday, January 01, 2007
Weekly Goals
If I am going to succeed in this dissertation endeavor, I will have to make regular progress toward getting finished. To that end, I will need to meet regular weekly goals, which I will record here for my own benefit.
Writing: I need to write at least 5 hours per week on the existing chapter revisions, data analysis writeups, or other parts as they arise.
Data Collection (including transcription and cleanup): I will need to do about 20-25 hours per week on these parts, especially for the next 60 days.
Data Analysis (including coding, summarizing, memos, and other parts): Until the data collection is done, I will need to spend about 20 hrs per week here, doubling as the collection is done.
If I don't finish by May (which will be a minor inconvenience), August is a very real possibility...but I STILL need to be busy as hell.
Writing: I need to write at least 5 hours per week on the existing chapter revisions, data analysis writeups, or other parts as they arise.
Data Collection (including transcription and cleanup): I will need to do about 20-25 hours per week on these parts, especially for the next 60 days.
Data Analysis (including coding, summarizing, memos, and other parts): Until the data collection is done, I will need to spend about 20 hrs per week here, doubling as the collection is done.
If I don't finish by May (which will be a minor inconvenience), August is a very real possibility...but I STILL need to be busy as hell.
Saturday, December 16, 2006
Status Report
At least every other week (in other words, every other post), I will post a status report for my dissertation research. So without further ado, here is the first table.
What can be immediately seen is that I have a lot of work to do!
At this point, I have identified 56 interviews that I will need to conduct. This number is most likely too low as I will likely need to conduct re-interviews of some people and new people will come into the picture. However, based on the interviews that I have identified so far, 56 is the right number. Of those, 31 remain to be scheduled, 33 have yet to be conducted, 10 others have been conducted but will need to be transcribed, and only 1 has been coded and summarized (but I will likely need to redo it).
The interviews can all be conducted by the end of January (7 per week, not counting those that are done before the EOY). I fortunately have an excellent transcriptionist that can work with me, so if those are done, I think I can have them back to me by the end of Feb. I will likely need to add another transcriptionist to keep from overburdening her, but that can be arranged. I can do one coding / analysis per day (Sat and Sun included) through the interview phase, but when that is done I hope to be up to 10 per week). Again counting revisions, I think I can be done with the coding phase by mid-March. If so, I will have about 5 weeks to really put something together for the April 30th deadline.
At first, this seems like a very bleak picture, but believe it or not, I can still graduate in May if I really push, but August is looking far more likely. Then, the deadline is July 9th for a first draft, July 30 for the final.
The table also shows that I have conducted 77% of the interviews for the first case site, with only six others to go -- and I will schedule these later this week, likely not finishing them until after the first of the year. By the EOY, I will have 5-8 more interviews transcribed and 10-15 of them coded and summarized. This means that during January, I can put together the first case site and try to write a first set of results.
So, it is not quite as bad as it sounds - but it is close to ominous...unless I get off my ass RIGHT NOW!
| Case 1 | Case 2 | Total | Remaining | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Counts | Percentage | Counts | Percentage | Counts | Percentage | Counts | Percentage | |
| Interviews | 26 | 100.0% | 30 | 100.0% | 56 | 100.0% | 0 | 0.0% |
| Scheduled | 20 | 76.9% | 5 | 16.7% | 25 | 44.6% | 31 | 55.4% |
| Conducted | 18 | 69.2% | 5 | 16.7% | 23 | 41.1% | 33 | 58.9% |
| Transcried | 10 | 38.5% | 3 | 10.0% | 13 | 23.2% | 43 | 76.8% |
| Coded | 1 | 3.8% | 0 | 0.0% | 1 | 1.8% | 55 | 98.2% |
| Summarized | 1 | 3.8% | 0 | 0.0% | 1 | 1.8% | 5 | 98.2% |
What can be immediately seen is that I have a lot of work to do!
At this point, I have identified 56 interviews that I will need to conduct. This number is most likely too low as I will likely need to conduct re-interviews of some people and new people will come into the picture. However, based on the interviews that I have identified so far, 56 is the right number. Of those, 31 remain to be scheduled, 33 have yet to be conducted, 10 others have been conducted but will need to be transcribed, and only 1 has been coded and summarized (but I will likely need to redo it).
The interviews can all be conducted by the end of January (7 per week, not counting those that are done before the EOY). I fortunately have an excellent transcriptionist that can work with me, so if those are done, I think I can have them back to me by the end of Feb. I will likely need to add another transcriptionist to keep from overburdening her, but that can be arranged. I can do one coding / analysis per day (Sat and Sun included) through the interview phase, but when that is done I hope to be up to 10 per week). Again counting revisions, I think I can be done with the coding phase by mid-March. If so, I will have about 5 weeks to really put something together for the April 30th deadline.
At first, this seems like a very bleak picture, but believe it or not, I can still graduate in May if I really push, but August is looking far more likely. Then, the deadline is July 9th for a first draft, July 30 for the final.
The table also shows that I have conducted 77% of the interviews for the first case site, with only six others to go -- and I will schedule these later this week, likely not finishing them until after the first of the year. By the EOY, I will have 5-8 more interviews transcribed and 10-15 of them coded and summarized. This means that during January, I can put together the first case site and try to write a first set of results.
So, it is not quite as bad as it sounds - but it is close to ominous...unless I get off my ass RIGHT NOW!
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