Random Thoughts
February 15, 2023
As I embark on growing One16 and started looking for talents to join us, I have been looking over a number of resumes. The one question that keeps floating through my mind is what makes a good researcher. Would someone who spends his/her entire career in the research field be a better researcher than someone who has less research skills but has significantly more business experience? I would suspect the answer lies somewhere in between.
Let's take me as an example. I spend the first 20 years of my career solely in the research industry, while I climbed the corporate ladder fast and was often the star of any research projects (clients specifically asked for me to lead the project), but was I really that good of a researcher?
Now looking back with much more entrepreneurial experience (I spent the past few years investing, starting, and running different businesses), I realized I had one glaring weakness throughout those early years as a researcher—the inability to provide higher-level value insights to the clients because I did not understand how research data were applied. Sure, I was very good at doing research—getting the data clients asked for, but I am not able to deliver more added value by turning end-user insights into more creative actionable strategies for the clients. However, now that I have had other business experience under my belt, I am much more able to deliver those higher-level values to our clients.
Well, that’s all I have to share for the week. And again, this is still just my humble opinion, and you are welcome to disagree with me. But please comment and let me know your thoughts so we can get a conversation going. Besides, please follow our socials for more!
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