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Finding the Information You Need — Research Tips for Your Family, Business, or Personal Pursuits

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CASE STUDIES

To give you an idea of how to research different topics, we've included several hypothetical case studies. The specifics and some of the resources (such as book titles) are invented. The methods and some of the resources (such as search engines and reference Web sites) are real.

Case Study #1: Sandra Calderon Gives a Party

Sandra announced to her new husband that the theme of the dinner party they were giving for their families would be a celebration of Jorge's Mexican heritage. Only one slight problem: Sandra had no idea how to go about it! She'd eaten plenty of Mexican food, but she'd never prepared any. And she'd never given a dinner party, either. With a little organized research and planning, though, Sandra and Jorge gave a party that delighted both sets of parents.

Here's how Sandra learned what she needed to know:

• First, she went to people. Sandra asked several close friends for favorite recipes and party-planning tips. The recipes for beans and rice were all fairly similar, and all her friends suggested she buy tortillas rather than making them. But the recipes for enchiladas were very different — the only similarity was that they were all complicated.

• Then she made a trip to the library — she didn't have any suitable books in her personal library. She searched the electronic card catalog for the keywords "Mexican food recipes" and found several cookbooks featuring Mexican food. She decided to look through these and see if she could find a simple recipe for enchiladas.

When she searched for "party planning," most of the search results turned out to be books about children's parties, but The Book of Creative Plans for Parties for All Occasions looked promising, though daunting at nearly 500 pages long. However, she jotted down the call number of the book and went to the shelves to look for it. She read the Table of Contents and found dozens of chapters on every kind of party imaginable; she decided to read the chapter on themed dinner parties.

She looked through the cookbooks, found a suitable recipe, and copied it onto a recipe card. She read the chapter from the party planning book and found a great idea for creating a centerpiece. Between her notes and her memory, she didn't even need to check out any of the books.

• Using a computer in the library, Sandra did a search on Google.com for the keywords "Mexican theme party" and found a Web site with decoration suggestions for a Mexican theme party. The suggestion of using a piñata as a decoration excited Sandra, because she and Jorge each had younger siblings who would enjoy the game of breaking the piñata after dinner. She then went back to Google.com, clicked "Advanced Search" and selected Froogle.com under "Topic-Specific Searches" to find products for sale on the Web. The search for piñatas returned several merchants selling piñatas (as well as some selling books, audios, or videos with piñatas in the title). When Sandra found one she liked, with suitable price, shipping, and privacy terms, she placed her order.

• As Sandra planned her party, she found she had a lot of other questions. When she came up with a question, she went back to her first source of information — people.

Sandra and Jorge's first dinner party was a huge success — Jorge's mother even asked Sandra for her enchilada recipe!

Case Study #2: Marshall Mason Learns About a Medical Condition — and About His Late Father

Marshall knew he should take better care of himself — eat a healthier diet, get more exercise, lose some weight — but he thought he was in fairly good health. When he was diagnosed with hypertension (high blood pressure) at age 42, he didn't think it was anything to worry about. His father had suffered from high blood pressure, but not until he was in his late 60s. And he'd died in his 70s — but from a heart attack, not from hypertension.

Marshall figured he could just find the right treatment and get cured. His doctor prescribed medication, recommended certain lifestyle changes, and suggested Marshall learn more about hypertension. Marshall expected he'd be fine, but he wanted to find out for sure.Marshall researched his medical condition this way:

•He mentioned the diagnosis at his office and discovered that several other people had the condition. He talked to each of his coworkers who told him they also had hypertension — some had been diagnosed years ago, some recently. Some of their conditions were well-controlled, others weren't. Each person had a different perspective and experience to share.

• As recommended by his doctor, he read the information about high blood pressure provided by the American Heart Association on the organization's Web site. When he learned of the serious risk hypertension posed for heart disease and stroke, he followed links on the site to more detailed information about the condition. The more he read, the more he wanted to take control of his own health.

•He searched at Yahoo.com for "hypertension treatment." Seeing that most of the results were clinical studies and medical documents, Marshall searched again for "high blood pressure." He read through the descriptions of the top two pages of results; after eliminating those featuring books about high blood pressure and those that were obviously unrelated, he narrowed the results down to about a dozen Web sites, which he then visited. He read "About Us" at each site and discovered that several were sponsored by companies selling blood pressure monitoring equipment and alternative treatments. He found it difficult to determine the reliability of a couple more, so he didn't read their content — there wasn't enough background information to convince Marshall that these sites were as reliable as the sites for the American Heart Association, the National Institutes of Health, The Canadian Coalition for High Blood Pressure Prevention and Control, and other sources of information that he found.

•Marshall wanted to know more about the medication his doctor prescribed. So he did searches on Yahoo and Google for "prescription drug reference" and went to the top 10 Web sites listed. He looked for "About Us" on the menus and checked out each site before reading about his medications. Six of the top 10 listings proved to be online pharmacies selling prescription drugs. Though they claimed to offer reliable drug information, Marshall preferred to get his information from sites that were providing facts without attempting to sell him products. He read about his medication at Medline Plus Drug Information (which is from the US National Institutes of Health, a government agency) and WebMD ( a consumer health site, which he viewed after he read the site's editorial policy). He discovered that two other sites ranking high in the search engine listings were subscription/membership sites for medical professionals.

•Before going to the public library, Marshall looked in his personal library, which included an unopened box of books and other materials he'd inherited from his parents. He found a book entitled Controlling Your Blood Pressure and discovered margin notes in his father's handwriting. Tucked inside the back cover of the book he also found a handwritten journal, detailing his father's experiences with heart disease. The copyright date of the book was 20 years earlier, so he knew the information was outdated. However, reading about his father's experiences was priceless.

•A trip to the public library yielded several books about hypertension, heart disease, and living a healthy lifestyle as well an exercise video. Marshall even found a recent edition of the book Controlling Your Blood Pressure.

•Marshall used the information he gathered from his research to put together a self-help plan. At his next appointment with his doctor, he presented his plan and asked his doctor for advice. His doctor was impressed with the initiative Marshall had taken — and pleased with the improvement in his blood pressure readings.

•Deciding he needed the support of other people to stick to his healthy lifestyle plan, Marshall registered as a member of the community forum at the WebMD site. He could give or receive encouragement in the online forum and post or answer questions — using a huge network of people as his information source.

Marshall began his research to find an easy answer, a "cure" for his medical condition. He learned that there is no easy answer, no cure for hypertension. But he has established a plan with his doctor, learned about his medication, developed a self-help program, created a support group, and discovered a family treasure he didn't know existed.

Case Study #3: Ramsey Enterprises Benefits Its Employees

Sue Henson, human resources manager of Ramsey Enterprises in Indiana, had to propose a benefits package for the next fiscal year that fit the small company's limited budget and satisfied the employees.

•Sue knew that the company couldn't offer everything the employees wanted, so she decided to determine what was most important to the staff. She went to the significant people — the employees themselves — and scheduled a combination of written surveys and focus groups.

•She also took advantage of several organizations that the company belonged to. The industry association offered member discounts on benefits packages from several companies, so Sue requested a list of all the companies and the products they offered. A local business organization had compiled a report for small businesses on selecting employee benefits, and Sue reviewed a copy of the report.

•Sue accessed her public library from her computer at work and logged in to NetLibrary, using her library card number. She browsed several books on employee benefits and checked out the latest edition of Benefits Guide for Employers. The book contained detailed descriptions of every imaginable kind of benefit, some Ramsey Enterprises had never considered.

•She also used the specialized business research center of her public library. At first, she searched articles in business journals, using the keywords "employee benefits." When she got more than 20,000 articles returned, she realized she had to narrow her search more. Then, she changed her search terms to "employee benefits small business," and narrowed her search to only magazines and journals. That brought her 73 results, and a quick scan through the descriptions narrowed the useful articles to just a few. She copied some important points and pasted them into a word processing document, making sure she put quotation marks around the information that she copied verbatim and included full details about the source.

• Sue called the library and asked the reference librarian if the library had information about employee benefits. The librarian called back to report there were several books on employee motivation that might be helpful in selecting benefits. Sue made a trip to the library and checked out the recommended books, which gave her valuable insights.

•Sue had bookmarked a business search engine — Business.com — since she used the Internet for business research frequently. She went to the directory, selected "human resources," then "compensation & benefits." She found sites that offered advice on choosing benefits and sites selling benefits programs. At this stage, she didn't spend time looking at the benefits programs — only at the advice — but she made a note to return to this search engine when she was ready to start choosing specific products.

•Sue's search for "employee benefits small business" on Google and Yahoo turned up a lot of Web sites in England. Adding "US" to her search terms gave her better results, though she had to review the sites carefully since not all were reliable. On a government site with up-to-date news in the field of benefits, she learned of new innovations in benefits — employees paid the costs, so the benefits didn't impact the companies' financial statements, but the employees benefited from the bulk rates the companies received.

•Armed with the knowledge (from the surveys and focus groups) of what benefits were most valuable to employees, Sue continued her research to obtain specifics about particular products and pricing, from representatives, written proposals, and Web sites.

By the time Sue presented her proposal to senior management on the best benefits package for the employees of Ramsey Enterprises, she had used a number of sources: the employees themselves; industry and business organizations; the public library — online, by telephone, and in person; and the Internet. The result was a benefits package that far exceeded that offered by any of Ramsey's competitors at a cost well within the company's budget.

RESEARCH? YES, ME!

Research isn't such a scary thing anymore, is it? You may already do more research than you realized. If so, we hope this will help you do it more efficiently. If you haven't been doing much research, maybe you'll soon be finding information for a project at work or learning how to do a home repair job on your own. This report can show you how to get the research done.

Decide exactly what you want to know and narrow your research to focus on your topic. Get organized and be prepared to take notes. Then head to the library, Internet, or even other people for the information you need. You’ll be amazed how easy it can be!

 

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