Late Night Library Musings

Been cracking my head on a research issue... Been here in the library all day, skimming through documents, coding, thinking and panicking. Did not even notice that time flew so fast! So night time falls and I decided to try draw the picture of my situation.

So this is a glimpse of how my brain looks like (I'm sure the jumbled thoughts in my head must be amplified by a 1000x). Pictures are a bit blurred but I need a form of reference of my musings. 

At this rate... I'm getting really worried. But I don't think I'll get anything more done for tonight... so off to home now...

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Just in case you are interested in what I'm fussing about:

My research question is: To what extent does programme risk management practice contribute to achieving UNDP programme outcomes?

My research method is designed to be unobtrusive; thus I am heavily depending on using UN documents that have been already created and published. Using these documents  I am trying to infer the extent of (1) how UNDP country programmes uses/perceives  programme risk management and (2) how programme risk management is valued in the process of achieving programme outcomes.

Through my research so far I have been able to:

• Trim down my study's target population to 15 countries within the Europe and CIS region.
• Set the time-frame of the programme cycles to be within the years 2005-2011; the rationale being, so that the outcomes are already evident.
• Gather, complete and read the top 3 country programme documents (UNDAF, CPD and CPAP) of the 15 countries; where the documents have narrated how the programmes are supposed to be managed (but only some includes a risk management aspect)
• Skim through the ERC website, where the documents can give me inferences of the outcomes of the programmes.

What is causing me to worry is: so far I hardly see any explicit risk management aspect in the documents that I have. In addition, I've also gathered that the UN system has proposed and implemented an enterprise risk management framework; but I have realised that the framework was introduced in 2008, mid-way through the programme cycle (therefore will not be evident in the documents that I have).

What am I Doing???

I just read Hillson's article; and I am appalled (maybe crushed or devastated even!).

We wanted to discover the best metrics for determining whether a risk management process is effective, and to find ways of showing a link between risk management and improved bottom-line outcomes.

Basically this is what I want to do with UNDP.

But...

Interestingly, the PMI Research Department felt that it was not possible to design an academic  research project to answer these questions directly, and they decided not to take the idea forward. 

This leaves an important and vexing question for risk practitioners – how do we prove we’re adding value?! 

That leaves me with the question... What am I doing??? Is it even possible to do my thesis???

I'm going to sleep on this... maybe tomorrow I will be in a better mood (less panicked state) to look at this objectively! :(