Managing Research Work

Managing Research Work: The following activities will lead one to manage his research work effectively:

a) Managing Yourself: Doing any kind of research work is a lonely experience. Sometimes it looks like that the person doing the research and his/her guide or supervisor is the only two people in this world who are interested in that particular subject. So, keeping it in mind the research scholar should not try to discuss about their research work with a common person unless he / she is the professional colleague.

b) Managing Friends and Family: It would be better if the researcher does not expect too much from his/her friend and family members, as they can do nothing, except giving a glimpse of encouraging words and a moral support. The researcher should also avoid in telling in an extensive way about the research work to the friends and family members, otherwise others may see the researcher like a bore. So, in simple, during the course of the research work the researcher should try to maintain a balance (though it’s really a difficult task) between research work and the social responsibility.

c) Managing Time: One cannot find more time than what he / she has. What one can do is only to manage his / her time for a productive work instead of spending it in the way of gossiping, unnecessary thinking, etc.

d) Managing Document: The research scholar should arrange all the resources collected or own resource,s i.e books, articles, etc. in a systematic way, so that in case of immediate retrieval it does not cost much time.

e) Research Diary: During the course of research work, the research diary should move along with the researcher. He/she should keep notes of everything (necessary/near unnecessary), because what today seems to be unnecessary may be relevant tomorrow.

f) Keeping Backup: During the course of the research work, different ideas will invade the mind of the researcher. Keeping a back up copy of these ideas by way of documenting over the note book may some times prove extraordinarily important. Some times ideas are invaluable one, and it may have the capacity to give a new wing to the researcher’s career. The researcher should also keep backup copy of the writing on daily basis, both in soft copy as well as hard copy ignoring whatever the cost may be.

g) Managing Supervisor: In any field of study, resource persons are very busy but they are also crucial to the success of any research work. The majority of the supervisors are highly experienced and will do their best to make the researcher’s visit to them productive and enjoyable (exceptions will always be there). So, as a research worker, the research scholar shouldn’t hesitate to use his /her supervisor within their legitimate time period.

h) Citation Style: Before going through the research work, the research scholar should determine which citation format he/she is going to follow and after wards whatever the research scholar reads, he / she should immediately include it in the reference page, according to the chosen citation style. It is crucial, if one does not want to include his/her name in the list of “plagiaries”, by not citing them. The normal strategy for longer quotation is to write it in italics, keeping a small gap before as well as after the quotation.