Generative Research

Hey everyone! After gathering some insights about my relatives and friends (see blog posts “Empathy map” and “Journey map”), it is high time to reveal some information about myself. I hope that the insights that I am going to share with you are not too shocking or unpleasant.

I have to admit right from the start that I have several items that are very important to me. To be more precise, I could hardly imagine my life without them. Credit card, water, phone, laptop and glasses are among these items.  I have attached two pictures for you to take a closer look at this “stuff”.

Some of them are rather obvious (water in Austin’s climate or credit card) but some might seem a little more mysterious.

My glasses play an extremely important role for me. I have bad eyesight and have to wear some kind of eyesight correction devices. After nearly fifteen years, my glasses have become to me more than a simple eyesight correction tool. They are an element of my style. And sometimes I feel that they make me feel a bit more confident in critical situations.

The other item that has a huge impact on my life is my laptop. It has accompanied me in every one of my trips: Malaysia, Argentina, South Korea, and throughout Europe. The importance of the laptop (and Skype) grew considerably since it is currently the only tool that allows me to communicate with my family in Russia.

Apart from the mentioned items, I have several things that are important to me but not vital to my existence. Not to keep you waiting for too long, they includes health, environment, United Nations, soccer and ID (passport).

I have volunteered for the United Nations for nearly three years and I know the value that this organization brings to the world. Having changed my career path I still support UN and care about all its humanitarian efforts and youth programs, world heritage and prevention of war conflicts.

Health, which is the other thing mentioned, might seem quite a vague term. I am very conscious about my health and sport plays an important role in my life, I have placed a picture of my sneakers as they help me keep fit while jogging and preserve my feet every day when I am going somewhere. Of course, jogging is not the only way I keep myself healthy – I also enjoy mountain skiing, swimming and cycling.

Passport might sound as an extremely weird thing to care about. But let me explain my reasoning for putting it on the list. I am young and in a foreign country. If I lose my passport, I will lose my identity :) I will not be allowed to enter any bar and more generally stay in the country. That makes a passport an important item that should be with me every time I am going out.

The next area that might contain interesting insights about me is my digital ecosystem. This could sound complicated and academic but in reality, it is quite simple. In fact, these are the ways I use to obtain news, information and any other online content.

My digital ecosystem includes three major areas: search engines, online newspapers or news portals and social networks. The picture below should provide a structured view of my ecosystem.

Online editions of nation-wide newspapers are my primary source of social, economic, and business news. For me it is important to keep up to date with the world’s events. Whenever I read the news (which typically happens several times a day), I try to think about potential consequences of, say, a political speech on the investment climate and businesses. It is always interesting to understand the facts and analyze the journalists’ assessment of events and form my own opinion about them based on several standpoints. Although this might be time-consuming at times, I go through two or three news sources before making comments about an event or news. This approach helps me remain open to different points of view and assess a situation in the best available manner. I also believe that online resources are less biased than the traditional TV or newspapers. Therefore, using online news portals allows me to develop my critical reasoning skills and protects me against brainwashing of certain news providers.

Social networks, primarily blogs, represent the next source of information that I use daily. Compared to online news portals that offer generalized facts, blogs provide me with updates regarding issues of my particular interest. I am an active follower of several blogs on LiveJournal and other blogger platforms. The range of bloggers and topics that interest me varies considerably. For instance, I am fond of several travelers’ blogs that post pictures of distant places with a short description to them. These blogs expand my knowledge of different countries and their places of interest. I often use the information gained at such blogs as a starting point when planning my vacation in a foreign country and creating a list of places to visit.

But I am also interested in gathering information about my hobbies, such as skiing and biking. Blogs and communities created around them help me follow the recent trends and rent different alpine skies whenever I go on a skiing vacation.

Finally, as many other representatives of the Millennial Generation I am actively using search engines. No matter whether I am looking for electronics, patents or presents for my friends, I typically go on Google first. This search engine offers one of the biggest results selection within an incredibly small amount of time. I am well aware that the recent developments in terms of targeted search might result in biased search results. However, using Google has become a true habit that I am unable to give up. And, to tell the truth, I do not really see necessity for doing so. With an exorbitant growth of world’s knowledge and available information, the only way to capture a fraction of this knowledge and get through the noise associated with it is to use web search. Search engines have made my life easier and thanks to that fact I consider myself a very loyal user of this online information channel.

Now let’s move to my typical weekday. To stir up you interested to this topic, I have prepared a small diagram (attached below). It describes the phases of my typical weekday and contains insights regarding types of information I “consume” during these stages. I hope that my handwriting is clear enough to read. If it is not the case, feel free to post questions about the diagram in the comments.

That’s it for today. I would be glad if you would post comments, make suggestions and provide constructive feedback. Take care and see you next week in my blog or in person.