I fielded a strange call today. It was from a university undertaking research sponsored either directly or indirectly by ClearBooks. I’d agreed to take part but quickly discovered problems. They started out by asking my background. These are supposed to be researchers and I knew they’d read my blog but they didn’t look at the about page? Not-a-good-start. From the blurbs:
Their goal is to explore the online accounting market, its size, how quickly it is growing and to compare it with the traditional accounting software market.
They’d been talking to vendors which is never a good idea because vendors are notorious at inflating numbers for their own advantage and making assertions about penetration which rarely stand any statistically valid test. They then started asking me about numbers. I”m not going there for third party research purposes. That’s taking a bit too generous a suck on the ol’ teat. They then asked about growth. That was easy and can be talked about quite readily. Then came the bit about how they’d grow. This is where life gets really complicated.
I’m often asked to opine on this topic and there is no right answer. A lot depends on the business model, the basis upon which you are building it, how funding impacts and so on. Given this was mooted by a vendor it seemed an odd thing to ask. They should be working these strategies out for themselves. And before anyone goes on about open this and that let’s be clear: growth strategies and plans are competitive. There is no way I am discussing those. Instead I can point to public examples of outcomes, along with statements I and others have made then put the question back to them, referring to recent events that might prove instructive.
They then wanted to get into some stuff around Sage – again -no problem. My position is in the public domain for all to see.
Finally they wanted to get some insider information around strategy. Again, I’m not going there except to the extent that things are in the public domain. I think they were a bit miffed but perhaps it is a lesson in research methods. Bottom line – if you want to make a case then you’d best do your own research. But if you want something independent then it’s not a good idea to hand it off to students who know little about the topic area.
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