A quick little post to emphasis how important it is to do your free searches as well as the searches from you subscription sources.
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This is not a sales story. It is a tale about locating people, and even when you have the good leads, it may not be easy.
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Listen, I use and value Opencorporates. It is fast and easy to search and very much less cost to use than my subscription services. Plus, it has coverage outside the US, which is pretty useful regardless of cost. Still, I know what I am getting within the world of open source. It is not the best. It helps to have a little history to know why. Then understand some of the other reasons your open source goodie may not do what you think.
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According to the Sources page on my Nexis screen, I have 6,935 international sources to use. Many of those are in English. Many are not. It does not mean I cannot use anything I find. This week an article in Spanish played a big role in a research project.
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In an ideal world, the questions would be simple and direct. The answers readily obtainable from solid public record resources. I’d pick up the assignment by nine, turn it in before dinner. Make myself a very tall gin and tonic and settle into an old episode of Rockford.
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To do great research, you have to know things before you find them. You must be aware of the meaning of names or context, and use that knowledge to drive your results. In a recent research project, coming across one company hammered home a point that otherwise took 30 pages of bullet points.
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In the course of doing deals, hiring people, taking on new clients, you meet many people. How far into hell will you go? What are you doing to find out.
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In which we expand a bit on ghosting and why some may do it.
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There are a lot of lessons one can learn from playing poker. Sometimes the lessons come not from playing poker but in hearing about people playing poker. In this post we learn that you cannot always trust people. A lesson valuable in all areas of life. Do you due diligence.
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Thanks to Pursuit Magazine for publishing me.
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I have been one of the lucky few to have had work and a relatively normal life over 74 days of lockdown and quarantine.
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Last weekend, I came across a tweet. One of those things that pinballed from its original circle of followers to the wider world. One person’s mix of amusement, frustration, surprise and outrage over what happened during their pre-employment check became fodder for the greater Twitterverse. It had become, what we call in my family, a mem-mem-ez (three syllables, hard zee at the finish). There’s a lot it made me think about. I’ve settled on two.
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Why might one choose public records. Why did my Dad choose an awl. Like a lot of dads, he liked to buy things for his toolbox, yet with all the things at his disposal, he reached all the time for his trusty, pointy, awl. That’s a good question. Why might I choose public records. I always thought the answer was because. On more thought, I have a few reasons and an example.
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I am sympathetic towards people that fail to adequately vet resumes because I understand some good reasons why it can happen. If you don’t turn up your radar, follow-up on leads, and keep up with the news though, I’ll take away those sympathies.
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This is your blog. Your chance to learn why I do what I do. When your results come via email, how did I get there. I’ve said many times, I have no secrets. I’ve linked to some of what I’ve written before. What should I write next. As they say over on Reddit. Ask me anything.
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I am, no humility needed, a very good researcher. What made me a good researcher from the start was my intense interest in wanting to know. I am quite nosy. More importantly, I already had an intense fascination with knowing things that would be invaluable to my job as a due diligence professional. Like, I had written a long dissertation on international organized crime. Having all this info packed into my gray matter made a huge difference in my skills. The shortcut to all that, I’ve always told people I’ve trained, is to be a regular reader of the Wall Street Journal.
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I challenged myself to write ten posts in ten days. Once that ended, I could have wrapped up the blog for a bit. I thought some of you might be interested, though, in Season 11. In this sequel you get my advice on two things to do if you want to become an ace open source researcher.
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The only thing that has kept me from being a productivity guru is a long standing history of being less than productive. Yet, I think a lot about being productive and improving my systems. Writing ten blog posts in ten days, helped me think a lot about how I set goals and go about my days. Instead of business research, I wrap up ten blog posts in ten days with some ideas on why I have top ten targets.
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The ink was barely dry on blog post eight when I realized there was more to say on link analysis. If link analysis is a process for finding what is not apparent, it is also process of laying out what is not clear. We use link analysis in many areas of business and investigative research including showing business structure, the flow of events and tracing money.
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In today’s stab at the challenge, we look at one the researcher’s favorite set of words, link analysis. A little background on what it means, a list of steps we take, and a big caveat in when we should use it. It’s enough to get you going.
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