The Contributions of Research to Operating Experience.

In this article, the author describes numerous ways in which social science research training is useful in the solution of problems faced by government policy makers. He also makes several suggestions about ways in which research in communications might be more helpful in solving foreign affairs problems. According to the author, three most common complaints about research operation are, sometimes research personnel are unable to state their findings in such a way that potential users of the research understand its meaning, the second complaint is closely allied to the first problem, that is, sometimes social researchers neglect doing a good job of market analysis of their product. The third complaint is that researchers sometimes fail to meet job deadlines. Nothing is more irritating to users of research than to have a research product arrive at their desk five minutes, five days, or five weeks after a policy or operational decision has been made. An exhaustive tome which covers every conceivable aspect of a problem may be a nice thing to have in files and it undoubtedly gives the author a sense of professional thoroughness in his work.