Research – where you find it

My daughter wrote: “Based on my observations of many and conversations with handfuls, a large number of scientists are not naturally inclined to network.” 

I’m trying to teach Marketing Research this fall (for the first time in probably 25 years), and I love the texture of this statement about observation and inference. (The classic statement on inference remains Ian Fleming’s character Auric Goldfinger on running across James Bond: “Once is happenstance. Twice is coincidence. The third time it’s enemy action.”)

I hope I can teach my students to observe many and converse with handfuls…and then draw meaningful inferences.