Objects in calendar are closer than they appear.

My project is technically on schedule, with a mid-point review planned for the beginning of next week, but that is a bit misleading: With four more weeks to go out of a total of eleven, I may have to present my findings on week nine or ten, "losing" a week critical for solidifying my research and recommendations. Twenty last days (net) which I will spend in part also networking and doing things outside the scope of my internship project, i.e. a networking event with alums arranged Dell HR. How many actual work days that does that leave me with? Objects in calendar really are closer than they appear.

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What comes to your mind when you think of market analysis? Is it as glamorous as this following bit?

One of my college professors once gave an interesting lecture about how analytically challenging are some engineering problems, yet how dull they are perceived to be and how they pale in comparison with, say, the more glamorous work of doctors and detectives as seen in movies and on TV. Seriously, you see so many medical dramas on prime time yet not a single House, MBA or House, PhD?
(That is not completely true anymore, actually: check out HOU$E OF LIE$ and The $treet. But for the sake of making my blog post unnecessarily long, let's assume it is.)

I can assure you that no one really thinks that market analysis is anything like diagnostic medicine. It is not about saving lives and it is agonizingly slow-paced sometimes. Also low on Latin, although certainly not on acronyms (it does not sound enticing, but can share that I am currently working on a SWOT analysis across all LOBs with a focus on SMB, if you insist!). No annoying patients, either. But it is amusingly about collecting data (test results, symptoms), solving a puzzle (a diagnosis or prognosis) and dealing with ambiguity. Analysis will only get you so far, we know what we know (and that is sadly particularly true in medicine), and the best we can do is work with the best hypothesis we have in a given moment.

That leaves us with the occasional chuckle from seeing how not only doctors blog, but some marketers do, too. There is neither glamour nor glory in market research - and there shouldn't be any, really - but it may amuse you to think that perhaps every now and then it is very much a similar kind of rigorous, tedious work.