A Good Plan: Regular, Frequent Meetings with My Chair

Yesterday, I had my first bi-weekly phone call with my chair for the semester. Prior to the call, I prepared by emailing her my thoughts and questions, which she said was helpful. We discussed her feedback to my ideas, which involved some simplification/streamlining of my research ideas. We also addressed my questions having to do with possible sample criteria and methodology.

By the end of the 30-minute call, while I hadn't been exactly sure what steps to take next, I had more clarity than before we talked. I had a list of four tasks on which to focus before the next phone meeting:

•       Consider narrowing focus a bit more as mentioned.
•       Look for mixed methods methodology, as I plan to use mixed methods, in studies related to my research interest.
•       Review mixed methods and the parallel/integrated approaches to mixed methods, both of which my chair referenced during our call
•       Learn how to mine data from Twitter, the social media network which will be the arena of my study.

Now that the ice is broken, I'm more looking forward to our next calls because I now have a clearer understanding about how to begin forging this research trail. 

Tonight, I began looking for ways to gather the data I want to use from Twitter through search engines and APIs. I found a number of useful papers and blogs which I downloaded into a folder to read over the weekend.

Things are looking up!

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Keeping track of source material and references

My strategy for tracking and referencing source material is pretty simplistic at this point. When I search articles on Google Scholar, I star them to add them to my library there. After reading an article, if I decide to use the source, I grab the APA reference citation from the Google Scholar search listing and add it to my references. I type in my direct or indirect quote and create the in-text citation to correspond to the source in the reference list, adjusting in case of multiple references by the same author(s) in a year.

For sources found elsewhere, I use the same method, copying the reference citation if possible and creating it myself otherwise.

I know there are a number of other ways to do this, but this mostly manual method helps implant the sources and contents into my thinking. Plus, the more a create citations myself, the better and faster I get at using APA format.

Here's a screenshot of a part of my Google Scholar library:

It's still light outside

After traveling for a couple of days for work and not getting any research in, it's Friday. That wonderful day I've labeled on my online calendar as THE day each week that I'll spend the ENTIRE workday working on the dissertation.

OK, I've had Friday penciled in for research and writing for the dissertation for about a year. This is the first Friday that I'll be able to spend a few hours on the project. Fortunately for me, it's still daylight, and I'm into that first hour after unscheduled work calls and emails have been resolved.

The first thing I did, after closing the bunches of work tabs on my computer browser, was to email my committee chair. That took some courage. I've emailed her a few times over the past month with my reasons for delay and best intentions. I didn't want this email to be the same, so I've put it off for a couple of weeks until I had a little work behind me. But I need the accountability and connection.

partial screenshot of the dreaded email, which I did send!

As I'm prioritizing and bulldozing other responsibilities out of this project's way more successfully this week, I decided it was time to take the step. Here's an excerpt:
OK, assuming my chair responds with a regular "meeting" time, I'll have locked myself into producing. It's time to get real. Now back to the mapping, reviewing, and adding to my baby drafts.

Hoping for the best this semester, and away from THIS mode!

Today: Dregs of the day

Just like yesterday, today my research work was relegated to the dregs, the weary end, of my already overloaded workday.

Me staring at/reading concept mapping articles on my computer tonight

I did manage to review some previous readings on concept mapping. I did this because my initial plan involves creating a concept map to help me visualize the elements of my study. It's been a pretty long time since I read about and practiced concept mapping, so I need to figure out how (and even why again) to approach my concept mapping process.

Along with a paper I wrote on concept mapping in a research course at the beginning of my Ph.D. program, I gleaned this gem of a succinct rationale and basis for approaching my concept map:

Based on the features provided by CmapTools, the student can use the concept map prepared as a pre-test as an initial step towards learning the pieces of knowledge that he/she needs to better understand, as the basis on which to perform the research that leads to this understanding, as a way to organize the various sources from which the student will construct this understanding, as the artifact with which to collaborate with peers, and as the means to present his/her findings at the end of the unit. Furthermore, the concept maps constructed by the student can become the foundation for a portfolio evaluation (see Vitale & Romance, 2000) of his/her performance. (Novak & Cañas, 2008, p. 17)

It's that "initial step" towards what knowledge I need to learn and understand that I want my concept map to be.

Next, I'll re-read that paper and the references to get myself oriented before beginning my concept map.

And about giving this effort better than the dregs of my day, tomorrow I plan to do this during earlier, fresher hours. Schedule, rearrange.

Reference

Novak, J. D., & Cañas, A. J. (2008). The theory underlying concept maps and how to
construct and use them (Technical report) (Rev. ed.). Florida Institute for Human &
Machine Cognition. Retrieved from
http://cmap.ihmc.us/docs/pdf/TheoryUnderlyingConceptMaps.pdf

How to pick up the pieces of a back-burner dissertation

How do you pick up the pieces of a seriously back-burner dissertation? I don't know, but I'm about to do it.

It's been a little over a year since I completed the final course in the Indy Tech Ph.D. program in Global Leadership and Organizational Management. My best-laid and committee-approved plans went awry--or should I say without follow-through for various reasons, and I've accomplished virtually nothing, other than living my very busy, mobile life. Running businesses, working with clients, helping my mother and mother-in-law, being a wife and mother, looking after myself.

Me with my awesome husband, son, and daughter

So now, with some newly self-imposed and divinely-inspired structure to allow myself the freedom to work toward achieving this goal (details available upon request), I'm off again to get this done, then on to the next chapter.

One Journey into Global Leadership Research

This blog is designed to chronicle the journey of one global leadership research student through her Ph.D. qualifying paper and dissertation at her university, Indiana Institute of Technology (Indiana Tech).

The impetus for blogging the journey came from a class in the Global Leadership Program at Indy Tech, LDS 7015, facilitated by Dr. Jonathan Westover. Two readings in one week's module focused on blogging through research processes and experiences (Bodenham, 2013; Carrigan, 2013). The author wrote during this particular week, 

• Self-knowledge and thought formulation are some byproducts of blogging about research: a) it helps me to be aware of how I am studying. 'Why am I doing this? - meaning why am I studying this way” (Bodenham, 2013, para. 5) and b) it helps ensure you can continue to develop strands of thought which, for now, don’t have any practical implications but might at some point in the future. (Carrigan, 2013, point 11).

The author plans to make two inital posts during 2016 as she prepares to produce her qualifying paper in early 2017, at which point the goal will be to make a blog entry every 1-2 weeks from that time through the end of the dissertation.

Questions, suggestions, and critique are welcome in comments.

  References

Bodenham, L. (2013, December 2). Good reasons why you should blog about your research. London Connection.  Retrieved from http://www.londoninternational.ac.uk/community/londonconnection/articles/toptips/good-reasons-why-you-should-blog-about-your-research

Carrigan, M. (2013, August 29). 40 reasons why you should blog about your research. The Sociological Connection. Retrieved from http://sociologicalimagination.org/archives/13910

Photo by Lenore Morales, 2015. Lincoln Road walkway from beach, Miami Beach, Florida.