defended than effort expended that does not even result in improved capacity
and confidence for the next venture. Even for negative or negligible findings,
the result may be important and one may be able to recognize and report learn-
ing with regard to the processes used. Also, an important point to recognize
is that, if early steps can be settled sufficiently to get started, help will

be found more readily available in later stages.

Title and Sub-Title, Definitions and Decisions

First steps in the conduct of inguiry include but are not limited to de-
cisions concerning terms of reference, scope, purpose(s), building theoretical
foundations and connections, finding and defining researchable problems(s),
generating guestions to be answered, formulating hypotheses as appropriate and
so on.

These, of course, cannot be resolved even in a preliminary way without
some concern for research design, selecting a population or sample, assuring
the validity of the instruments to be used, data collection, analysis, inter-
pretation and all the rest. 'Subseguent steps must be anticipated sufficiently
to suggest that problems as initially defined may be researchable or, at least,
that initial definitions and subseguent modifications may lead to researchable
alternatives and eventual outcomes.

The conduct of inguiry entails these and many other decisions in no way
given or automatic and subject to variation from case to case. Instead, the
many decisions involved are likely to be tentative, interdependent and risky
right up to the final stages in some projects. One might add, the more pio-
neering, the more risky. If there were certainty from the start, inguiry
would not be justified.

That decisions are involved all the way is often glossed over, yet cri-

tically important explicitly to recognize and record. Some of these might

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