Object – The idea

Creating and focusing a researchable topic was surprisingly difficult for interviewees. We know from the literature on research (Anastasiadis, Rajan, & Winchester, 2015; Hasson & Yarden, 2012; Sandelowski, 2008), librarianship (Hernon, 2001), and even information literacy (Nutefall & Ryder, 2010) that topic focus is challenging but essential. Participants emphasized the importance of committing to research and working out an idea to start with. As one junior

peer said, “My first year, has been to sort of think about my plan of attack for my research. So I’ve been kind of formulating ideas, thinking about ideas that I’m interested in. And then also narrowing that down to things that I’m interested in but actually want to move forward with to research and write about” (E3).

There are a number of strategies for librarians to get a starting idea. Some that came up in interviews are summarized – with example quotes – in the following list:

 Adapt or expand on ideas heard about at conferences: “There was a really interesting discussion afterwards [after a presentation at ALA], because some other librarians who were history subject specialists got up and said, ‘Well, this is really interesting because it’s very different from what I’m hearing from my faculty’” (B2);

 Apply ideas from the undergraduate or liaison subject discipline to library questions: “One thing is, [for librarians who come] from a history point of view, is that I would suggest looking at the archives materials we have here for research purposes” (D4);

 Brainstorm interests open-endedly with another researcher: “I had a boss who was an idea person. She was a forest kind of view instead of a trees kind of view. And if I would sit down with her and talk about what am I going to do for research we would come up with ten ideas in a 15-minute conversation” (A1);

 Document a new activity at work and compare it to other libraries’ practices and procedures: “So we developed these learning outcomes and then we wondered, ‘Hey like, what are other people doing?’ And it kind of went into this discussion

of how are other people developing these, but also like how are people assessing these” (F1);

 Document an event that surprises you at work and use it to develop a question: “So one of the earliest things I did was just take our reserves and see what there was available as an E-Book. And I was actually kind of shocked at that point to find how relatively little was available” (B1);

 Look at literature about or discuss with colleagues about personal or professional interests: “Their projects are generated from their interests, their experiences” (C2);

 Monitor solicitations for book chapters or special journal issues: “There’s a special issue coming out next year that is I think broadly about library collecting. So [our study] is a subcategory that sounded like a nice niche for that” (A1);

 Read appropriate journals for inspirations about the scope of ideas: “My next steps are narrowing down journals, researching those journals to see what has been in there, what it looks like in order to tailor what I’m doing to sort of fit that scope” (E3);

 Read the literature for holes or for identified “next step” suggestions: “So if you just read widely and keep up with what’s going on in your field then you’ll have an idea of what are the unanswered questions that you might be able to answer” (E1).

Using an existing frustration at work came up at all of the smaller institutions as a way to develop an idea that could both solve a problem and perform research. As one mentor

process, I would say look around at what you’re doing, find maybe a slightly new spin on it” (F2). Senior interviewees suggested that a simple report could be published in a mid-tier journal, or that a librarian could expand on a local issue with a survey of other libraries or a policy analysis across the profession. The expanding strategy was suggested as a way to scale up to a study that could be published in a higher-tier journal.

After getting an idea, focusing it provides another challenge to these participants.

Interviewees said that this was a complicated part, and implied that it affects their choices for the rest of the research process. For example, one interviewee said, “I think the problem we’re having is now we’ve got sort of two or three tangents going on right now. And they probably will interrelate at some point, but we’re not clear on, perfectly on, our research questions” (F1). Newer researchers among the participants found this hardest because their process of narrowing to a focused and measurable question interacts with the issue of methodological competence, so they wanted an experienced researcher or a large group to really refine the idea to a specific question of the right scope. As one said, “We can really bounce ideas and that’s incredibly helpful. And we just kind of have that type of relationship between all the people who work here … which is just a great environment to have, to have that kind of support and people checking in” (E1). Several interviewees mentioned discussing an idea with colleagues – co-authors, a discussion group, or senior librarians – as a good way to help refine the idea into an actionable question. This helps participants to bring the strengths of colleagues’ skills in data, technology, classification, research support, and other specialties into play as well as working by soliciting ideas through more general feedback.