The Editor's Chair
Put your questions to Armando Iannucci
It’s been a good 24 hours for writer, performer and producer Armando Iannucci. He’s just scooped an Oscar nomination for his film In The Loop, in the Best Adapted Screenplay category.
Some of you may know that Iannucci will be taking centre stage at Research 2010 (Twitter hashtag #res10) in March. He’s our keynote speaker and I’ll be interviewing him on the first day of conference. We will of course be taking questions from the floor on the day, but I wanted to offer you the opportunity to shape the interview right here and right now.
Iannucci is the man responsible for some of the UK’s most groundbreaking, successful and just downright funny television comedy in the last decade or so. He was one of the key men behind Alan Partridge, The Day Today, Time Trumpet, The Friday Night Armistice and, of course, The Thick of It.
The themes I will be tackling with him at conference will probably include research and the creative process, public disengagement with government and institutions (and the role that satirists have played in stoking that), the future of television and media, the downside of user-generated content and his own approach to marketing his work.
What would you want to ask him? I may well put your question on the day and credit you (if you want).
Get in touch with me here and let me know what you’d like to ask.
Did you feel the rush?
As a speaker at Annual Conference you’re always faced with what could best be termed as a broad church of delegates, some wildly interested in the subject, some a little curious and some passing through. You can also count on one or two who have turned up to the wrong session but are too exhausted to do anything about it. Not so with Research one day conferences.
You’re much more likely to draw a crowd of senior folk who have a very concentrated interest in the subject matter and who have paid a decent whack to hear some distilled intelligence. And so it was to this audience, at the Research Online Conference, that I presented the Ideas Rush: three presentations, each of five minutes only using only one slide – no builds. This format went down well at the Annual Conference earlier this year. The three highly-pressured and high-energy presenters were Pete Comley from Virtual Surveys, Steven Walden from Beyond Philosophy and Will Goodhand from Ipsos ASI. They proved to be an adept bunch.
Pete gave a heartfelt plea for an end to what he described as “crap” surveys. He choreographed the room with a series of ‘stand up, sit down’ exercises to illustrate his points, suitably reinvigorating delegates after lunch. Steven showcased the power of ‘in the moment’ research. He was a passionate advocate for ditching post-hoc work in favour of testing opinion while respondents were in the act of the very thing researchers wanted to find out about. Finally Will Goodhand, a dab hand at the presentation game, warned delegates against getting too excited by online technologies and methodologies and argued for the primacy of people, creative thinking and ideas over anything else.
Had to dash back to the office after the presentation, but it looked as though there was some really meaty material lined up for the rest of the day. You should have been there.
Were you in the room? What did you think of the session?
Research's Greatest Thinker
I’ve been chewing over some ideas for a potential session at next year’s annual conference and you may be of assistance.
One idea in particular has tickled me. You may remember some time ago that the BBC ran a competition to find The Greatest Briton. Celebs were signed up to choose a public figure and then fight the case for them on TV. Each celeb had an entire programme to showcase the talents of their chosen historical figure and then, after all the presentations had been made, the viewers got to vote on their choice.
In a fit of unbridled originality I have decided to rip off this idea for the delegate’s viewing pleasure.
I am in search of names for Research’s Greatest Thinker. But here’s the catch. It can’t be anyone still alive. And it can’t be a researcher. Easy, no? I’m looking for you to nominate historical, or even fictional figures who you believe, made a major unknowing contribution to the research world and to research thinking. Here are a couple of admittedly toe-curling examples. You could nominate Sherlock Holmes for his ability to glean penetrating insight from the most unpromising research findings, Charles Babbage for his services to data analysis, or Socrates for the development of interviewing technique. If your toes haven’t quite poked though the top of your shoes, you may wish to add to the pool of names.
I quite like the idea of putting together a session where eight or so research folk nominate and make the case for their research thinker of choice. Researchers will have around five minutes or so to win the crowd over, using a range of multimedia methods, powers of persuasion and passion.
Fancy making a stand? Add your thoughts to the thread below.
Let's interface in clarity mode
Every now and then I’ll use this blog to shamelessly plug something I like. This is a now and then moment. Tim Phillips is a regular contributor to Research. He has been a freelance journalist since 1990
writing about business, technology, social change and innovation. He has written for the Wall Street Journal Europe, The International Herald Tribune, The Times and Sunday Times, The Observer, The Telegraph, The Independent and The Daily Express among others. Suffice to say, he’s a prolific scribbler.
He has just started to blog and it’s well worth a look. His blog, Talk Normal, is a cry for plain speaking in business. It’s very instructive and it’s very funny. If you have anything to do with communicating with colleagues (that’s you), dealing with agencies and clients (that’s you, too) or giving presentations (that’s most of you) then heed some of his helpful advice. From next week, you won’t have to go far to find him as we’ll be syndicating his blog right here.
Researchers are as guilty as anyone when it comes to spewing jargon. Tim Phillips aims to clean up your act. Action this immediately.
Judgement Day
So, I’ve just left the judges’ meeting for this year’s Research Magazine awards. Five categories and forty long-listed entrants across the board. And, truth to tell, it’s been a funny old year for entries. Numbers were a tad down and the Best New Agency category was positively emaciated. No real surprise when you consider that the past 12 months have not exactly been the most conducive for buccaneering entrepreneurs willing to set up shop. That said, three very strong candidates have made the shortlist for that category.
Far more worrying was the number of agencies who put themselves forward in the Business Transformation category. We were on the hunt for evidence of research work that has “genuinely affected an organisation’s strategy, orientation, business or focus.” You know, all those things that we constantly say should be research’s prime mission? We’ve a shining shortlist, but the entry level for this category was somewhat woeful. Bemusing, really. In this most demanding of times, we really expected agencies to not only demonstrate having spurred a high level of business transformation, but to be swamped with agencies proud to shout it from the rooftops.
We had a storming response to the Best Agency, the Best New Agency and the Best Place to Work categories. And that’s great. But when it all goes quiet on the research-as-an-agent-for-change front, you have to worry.
However, there was plenty for the judges to get their teeth into right across the board. No punches were thrown, but there was certainly stormier debate than we’ve had for a while. We are very confident that we’ve whittled the long-list down to very strong short-lists. We’re also confident that our winners are very worthy of the fame, boasting rights and potential business that’s heading their way when the awards are announced in December. Until then, we’re keeping shtum. You’re getting nothing out of us.
