Outsourced Insight cc

What goes into good Research Design, you ask?

Glad you asked. In short, we do!

Quantitative or Qualitative?

We can assist you in designing a research project. This will include deciding on whether a representative sample quantitative survey [face-to-face, postal, electronic] or qualitative set of focus group discussions or in-depth interviews will achieve your research objectives. Both may be necessary, in order to elucidate different aspects of your
research problem.

Data coding and capturing

Once your data has been collected, the instruments require checking for completion, the coding of open-ended questions and the capturing of the data. It is essential that all of these processes are done thoroughly and systematically to ensure accuracy and authenticity.

Who runs the consultancy?

Outsourced Insight cc was established in May 2005 by Stephen & Susan Rule. Regular collaborating consultants include Godfrey Dlulane, Robin Richards, Sydney Fryer, Tim Clynick and Ray Basson.

Prior to 2005, Stephen worked as Surveys Director at the Human Sciences Research Council;

Research Director to the Minister of Social Development; Specialist Researcher at the Community Agency for Social Enquiry; and Senior Lecturer in Geography at Vista University (now incorporated into University of Johannesburg).

He completed a PhD at the University of the Witwatersrand in 1996, which focussed on electoral politics across southern Africa.

He has authored a wide range of reports, peer-reviewed journal articles, chapters and books and has served on the Boards of the National Development Agency and the South African Monitoring and Evaluation Association.

Research is to see what everybody else has seen, and to think what nobody else has thought.

– Albert Szent-Gyorgyi