Sadly, most research simply confirms things we already know rather than surfacing fresh insights or advancing new frontiers. Thomas Kuhn describes how most science operates within an existing tradition. It mostly adds nuance to a pre-existing body of knowledge. Periods of relative calm are then shaken by new ways of looking at things. The distinction is significant. On the one hand, there is definitional research that adds meaning to what we know. On the other, there’s re-definitional research that changes how we know.

Herbert Butterfield describes (The Origins of Modern Science) how these breakthroughs come from “picking up the other end of the stick” and involve “handling the same bundle of data as before but placed in a different framework.” Significantly, change comes about less from the sudden onset of new evidence as from “transpositions taking place in the minds of the scientists themselves.” In other words, it is not so much that new facts cause them to change their perspective as that a fresh perspective leads them to interpret the hoard of existing facts anew.

As business people who commission research or researchers who undertake it, what can we learn from this?

The distinction between definitional and re-definitional is striking. There are many instances (for example, brand tracking studies or econometric ROI analyses) where one is in a definitional mode. E.G. We might want to know whether a particular marketing program is working in the intended manner and what variance there may be this year over last year, or this segment versus that one. And then there are the times when what’s called for is something bolder; something that re-defines the category.

Butterfield published 65 years ago. But his analysis of what constitutes a breakthrough –and how they come about- is as relevant as ever.

• Pick up the other end of the stick. The origin of the phrase comes from the fact that to avoid slipping on muddy lanes, people use a wooden staff. One end goes in the hand, the other in the dirt. Someone who gets ‘the wrong end of the stick’ is someone who doesn’t know what’s what. However, in order to bring about a trans-positional shift it is necessary to turn the problem –or accepted wisdom- on its head: to come at things from an unexpected angle.
• Take the data but conceptualize it differently. Chances are, your competitors have access to similar market information and similar types of consumer research as you. It’s often called ‘proprietary research’ but it seldom is. The knack is to assume “if everyone is using the data this way, is there a way to approach it differently?”
• Place the elements in a new and different framework. Context defines meaning. Many times, it helps to reframe the question so that one goes from the familiar to the unfamiliar, or to take inspiration from something external to the category so that one goes from the unfamiliar to the familiar.

After all, who wants to be thought a stick in the mud?