My December 2013 update on my research

So I have presumptuously began collecting and analysing data for my research. This is despite the fact that I have not yet given the revised proposal draft to my committee for approval. (Keeping my fingers crossed that it is better now and almost worthy of approval). Any way, I just want to share in this post briefly an update about some of my thinking as it relates to my current research and possibly future direction.

The general gist of my research has to do with constructing a profile of those who tweet and blog about library consultants and library consulting and analysing from these tweets and blog posts the presentation of the library consultant identity. In essence I hope to examine and analyse the identity of library consultants and library consulting as discussed and formulated in blogs and tweets. My approach is to use mixed methods, collecting both quantitative attributes and analysing qualitatively the narratives that I see emerging. In the end, I hope to tell 'a story' on library consultants and library consulting pulling the various strands of data together.


I have also been reading Simon Down's (2006) Narratives of enterprise. In my view, Down (2006) presents a good ethnography of how entrepreneurs craft their identity that may be relevant for my thesis on the crafting of the library consultant identity. However, after completing the reading, I realised that the book has had a profound impact on my own existentialism.


In some regards, Down is like me. He is an academic who has had a previous life as an entrepreneur. He also wrestles with his own self-identity as an academic who still feels the calling to an entrepreneurial identity. He also finds himself critical of entrepreneurial narratives as they tend to be anti-social. His work has got me wondering if the entrepreneurial and enterprising identity can be compatible with good moral values.


These ideas also relate to what I am findng about librarians' views on library consultants who charge for their services. A Judas or betrayal to the profession theme is emerging even though I haven't really started the 'deep' analysis. So far I have seen two particular tweets that summarise this perspective. One tweet in 2008 where a librarian remarked [not verbatim to protect anonymity] 'Am I the only person disturbed by this listing of paid library consultants?' In a more recent tweet, another librarian remarked that 'what library consultants should be doing is lobbying businesses to create more librarian positions' [again not verbatim]. From these tweets, it seems to me that there is a sinister picture being painted about library consultants who charge for their knowledge, expertise and services.


Yet this is also contrasted by other tweets and blog posts, where there is an event where library consultants offer free library consulting services (ASCLA, 2013). Or a tweet by a librarian praising another person for being a 'good library consultant' [not sure though if the person doing the consulting was paid though].

So far, the story being told about library consultants and library consulting on blogs and tweets is an intriguing one, where most times they are portrayed as villains, both by librarians or even the public who express outrage at the fees charged or money spent on them. Yet, there is seemingly praise for those who engage in no-paid library consulting services. However, I can't disclose all my ideas here, but just some of the preliminary notes and perceptions that I am forming of the data as I go through. For more, you've got to read the thesis when it is done or follow up on my future publications.


References:

Association of Specialized and Cooperative Library Agencies [ASCLA] (2013). 'Consultants give back: Free 30-minute sessions in Chicago co-sponsored by ASCLA and PLA'. [blog post]. Retrieved from
http://ascla.ala.org/blog/2013/05/news-consultants-give-back-free-30-minute-sessions-in-chicago-co-sponsored-by-ascla-and-pla/

Down, S. (2006). Narratives of enterprise: Crafting entrepreneurial self-identity in a small firm. Chelteham, UK: Edward Elgar Publishing.

 






 

Thesis Idea Update: Providing Access to Entrepreneur Blogs through Conversational Agents?

I have been working for the entire summer on two guided reading papers, after which I will prepare for comprehensive examinations, all things going well.

I just wanted to post an update on my thoughts as to a possible direction for my thesis. As some of you know, I have an interest in the use of conversational type agents for providing online information to entrepreneurs. As it stands today, I am not sure if I have the time to develop a prototype adequate enough to be tested for dissertation purposes. Hence, I am considering to just include agents as a chapter in the thesis, perhaps proposing that agents be considered for future in connecting business persons to stories shared on the Web.

 

I guess the larger vision is to create a system for sharing business information, that captures people's business stories in whatever format, and make that accessible to users. This could be through conversational interaction with virtual agents or otherwise (which may involve multimedia information retrieval). 

 

Since no such system exist, but would have to be created, I guess I have limited options, especially constrained by time. I could undertake a project where I would collect the online stories shared by  Jamaican/Canadian entrepreneurs (or both) in whatever online format (social media or regularly Web), and then index and categorise them into motifs. These categories and motifs I would input into multiple conversational agents: the trickster personality for stories that feature wit and intelligence to outsmarting bureaucratic obstacles; the victim personality for stories that deal with tragedy and the hero personality: that deals with stories about overcoming odds and attaining success.

Based on Technorati  2011 report, I know that a large percentage of blogs are created by entrepreneurs who are sharing their stories. I also know that based on a Pew Internet Research report, bloggers are seen as storytellers (Lenhart & Fox, 2006). I see the possibility of indexing and categorising these stories to be the source materials for developing the agents. However, I also believe I could provide access to these entrepreneur blogs or stories  without the use of conversational agents, as I can use a blog or content management system to index and organise a kind of directory to entrepreneur blogs and stories on the Web.

 

Possible research questions thus far for such a project:

 

1. What knowledge is being shared via social media by entrepreneurs' storytelling?
2. Are current motifs and categories of organisational storytelling literature adequate for indexing and categorising entrepreneurs' storytelling via social media?
3. To what extent would making entrepreneur stories accessible via the Web be useful?

 

If I was able to create an adequate agent, I would add this question for testing:

 

4. Would such stories be more accessible if users interacted with virtual agents rather than browsing and keyword searching?

References;

Lenhart, A., & Fox, S. (2006). Bloggers: A portrait of the internet’s new storytellers. Pew Internet & American Life Project. Retrieved from http://www.pewinternet.org/~/media//Files/Reports/2006/PIP%20Bloggers%20Report%20July%2019%202006.pdf.pdf 

Technorati. (2011). State of the blogosphere 2011: Introduction and methodology. Retrieved 6/13/2012, 2012, from http://technorati.com/social-media/article/state-of-the-blogosphere-2011-introduction/

Folklore as an information source for businesses

For this summer, I am investigating the feasiblity of folklore and storytelling being applied to modern online delivery of business information. So far, my hunch that guides my thesis is that folklore and storytelling, prior to the invention of writing, as oral art forms, were the means employed for communicating, providing or sharing information and as ancient techniques for information delivery. Since today’s online culture of information provision borders on a combination of print and oral traditions in information provision, the quest is to discover how folklore and storytelling can feasibly be applied in the modern online environment to delivery of serious or non-fiction information, and specifically apply these to communicating and providing business information, to entrepreneurs and micro-enterprise owners. 

As I have begun the readings on folklore, I see 3 main ideas emerging:

1. The theme of folklore as an economic resource for exploitation by business and capital, and how current developments in information technology and legislation have now positioned a new area for the exploration of folklore as a resource for commercial exploitation

2. The importance of a folklore collection as a source of information, not only for folklore academic researchers and humanists, but for a wide group of potential and enterprising business groups in the creative enterprises and industries such as game development, authors and creative writers, film, animation, graphics design, advertising, theatre, publishing, leisure, tourism and travel, landscapers, architects, fashion and other industry players involved in providing entertainment.

3. Folklore as an information source for businesses seeking to go global - having understanding of customs, characters, motifs and other folkloric content can help an entrepreneur from one nation create/develop appropriate services and marketing campaigns for customers in another nation.

As such, I see there is already a connection between folklore and business/enterprises. I also see a justified place for folklore collection in libraries for entrepreneurs. I am excited by what I have been finding so far, though I have not yet started to explore the use of folklore in actual information provision.

My research to focus on Student Entrepreneurs

I have decided to narrow my studies to focus on student entrepreneurs and their information needs. This focus emerged from the challenge of studying small businesses, as there are many varieties and flavours of the term. There are competing definitions of small business, as well as the fact that current entrepreneurship recognises that there are various sub categories within small businesses that have special or unique needs and problems. There are Women owned businesses, Mompreneurs and Family businesses to name a few.


The literature of information seeking studies tend to focus on large firms, corporate executives and on managers. My study on the other hand want to zoom in on university or college students and their needs for information. I assume that  university students need information for undertaking entrepreneurship that may be different from other entrepreneurs.

I feel that students are different because they:

1. usually work and study
2. might be on student loan and may be more timid to take a risk to venture into entrepreneurship if they are not sure how they can pay back their student loan
3. are expected by society's traditional norms to get jobs
4. usually have less work/working experience to capitalise on, and 
5. may not have the connections to social capital or other networks needed to establish business

I am going to also focus on how academic libraries can provide information services to help these students meet their information needs.

The first step however in my research proposal for my doctoral dissertation is to first find out what government information services exist online for these student entrepreneurs and potential student entrepreneurs. Does the government provide online information accessible to these students to assist them to launch their businesses and start-ups?

Student entrepreneurship is not new. Many high-tech companies such as Microsoft, Facebook, Yahoo, Google were all start-ups launched by university students.

Refining my research proposal idea

With some of my minor assignments out of the way, I have now returned to my dissertation topic and proposal. Based on feedback in class and learning about ethics review at FIMS, I am totally scaling down the topic. One of the issues that I am deciding to do is to study documents rather than people in order to escape Ethics board. However today, I became much more closer to identifying who I would study after reading a newspaper article. This I will elaborate on some more in this post.

One of the issues that came up with my research topic was that the definition of small business is very wide, and within contemporary studies of small business owners, there are several typologies and niche groups. I have heard of Women-owned businesses, family-owned businesses, and as of lately - mompreneurs. For the latter, I actuall saw this term in an issue of the Western News here at UWO entitled:  "Exploring the motivations of 'Mompreneurs'" by Paul Mayne published on October 13, 2011. See the link for the article: http://communications.uwo.ca/western_news/stories/2011/October/exploring_the_motivations_of_mompreneurs.html


Today, another newspaper kind of helped me to pick a niche group of small businesses that I think I want to study. This is the group of college students and/or college graduate entrepreneurs. I am not sure what is the right term for them yet and the type of business that they would be classified as. But I do know that I want to narrow my focus these as a user group in need of online business information/library services.

In an article in the London Metro, entitled: "It’s been a pleasure doing business", Vered Ben gives her experience of how she has started 2 businesses during her studies (page 14).  You can also read her story via the link: http://www.metronews.ca/london/learn/article/1019449--it-s-been-a-pleasure-doing-business. In the closing paragraph of her article, Ben states that:

"Most career centres and schools focus a lot on grades, career options and resumes, and usually do not let students think outside the box when it comes to job searching. I think schools should help students see that working for yourself can be a great option."

I believe than more universities are doing exactly that, and will in another post collect some of those articles to demonstrate that point.