Review of Progress Made in Implementing My 2016 Systems

My list of 2016 systems for myself included the usual ideas, such as eating better and exercising more frequently.  Among those ideas were some serious commitments that I needed to make towards taking control of my genealogical research by documenting the sources I find and have found in the past.  Stopping the process of finding documents and not bothering to examine and analyze them until much later or ever.  Also, becoming more diligent about filing away the information I’ve collected after examining and analyzing it.

In looking back at 2016 and these systems that I created for myself to follow, some of these ideas did bear some small fruit and others just simply didn’t pan out for a myriad of reasons.  The documenting my sources did work out because I made a conscious effort to create citations or at least note down pertinent information about a particular source while I had in front of me and spent time over a period of months creating citations for items I’d found in the past.  After completing my research at a repository I wrote citations for the items viewed while still on site or immediately after leaving having that information still fresh in my mind.  Instead of writing these source citations sometimes weeks, months, or years later when I was trying to analyze the source later and write about.

In order to document, examine, and analyze these newly found bits of information, I came up with the process of after returning from a repository of entering the item into my research log which included the source citation, then entering the source into Evidentia and using that program to examine and analyze the source.

I tried using Evernote when researching online as a way to help me get into the habit of creating source citations when I found a piece of information or didn’t.  What I found was that it was easier for me to just not use Evernote when downloading a digital image of a document found online and instead save the image file to the pertinent research folder on my computer and record the search and findings along with a source citation in my research log.

Attempting to Take Control of my Genealogical Research

Earlier this year I considered making a list of New Year’s resolutions; however, I decided not to do this.  The reason being is that they’re essentially goals that you set for yourself.  My husband had recently read a book by Scott Adams and in the book Scott said that “goals are for losers and systems are for winners.”  This outlook of Scott Adams changed my viewpoint on goals and resolutions so I decided to try to go about planning and organizing my life or at least one aspect of my life differently.

So instead of creating actual resolutions for myself I made a list of Genealogy Goals for 2015.  Yes, I know, goals are for losers; however, I did include an item about how I can try to take control of my research.  Basically, I want to have a system for how I deal with the stuff that I find when I’m researching.

The taking control of my research idea is from the January 2015 issue of the Greater Omaha Genealogical Society’s newsletter, Westward Into Nebraska.  They had an article by Lisa Alzo that was taken from her blog.  I read the article and was inspired to “take control of my research!” This is what got me thinking of how to create a system for how I process the information I find after searching for it. 

It did take me some time because it’s now March and I haven’t really implemented my new found system.  I’ve taken some steps to organize it and manage it, such as I came up with the idea to add a source citation column to my research log.  Another column I created was one for Source Analysis.  These are two of the steps I took to get control of it, because Lisa’s article got me thinking about what bad habits I have in regards to my research.  As I sat and thought about it, I realized that my bad genealogy habits are not writing down the source citations right away for the things I find.  I do put the information almost immediately into my research log, and will mention where I found the stuff.  But after I’ve finished that task, no formal citation is ever written for the source of the information I’ve perhaps spent weeks, months, or years thinking about how to find, searching for it, and then perhaps finding a small piece to the puzzle.  The other bad habit I have with my research is never stopping to analyze the source and writing about my research findings formally, instead of just writing about some of the happenings in this blog.

Once I realized what these bad habits were, I needed to come up with a way to deal with them and stop my bad habits.  Yes, I’ve included source citations in my genealogy software program for the different life events of my ancestors, and some of these sources are duplicated on my WeRelate page.  However, I didn’t have anything written down in one central place for all of my sources.  So that’s what led me to create columns for citations and analysis in my research log, so that everything would be in one place and that I wouldn’t be able to walk away once I’d entered in finding a particular piece of information or having visited a website and coming up empty.  The fact that I needed to cite the source would be staring me at in the face, so I would likely feel compelled to write a citation for the information or lack thereof.

While I was at the RootsTech/FGS conference I overheard some people near my booth talking about the Evidentia program.  It’s for managing the sources that you’ve accumulated.  I was intrigued by it, but as it was extremely busy in the exhibit hall I didn’t have much time to go in search of their booth and find out more. 

However, soon after hearing about the software, the guy from the company stopped by my booth early one morning before the hall opened to ask me a question about something in regards to the conference.  I saw that he was with the Evidentia company and asked him about the program.  He gave me some information and later when one of my colleagues watched the booth, I went over to learn more.  I did buy the software and have begun using it, but still want to finish my project of sourcing everything that’s in my research log.  I’ll write more about what progress I’m making with citing my sources, how my system is working out for me, and perhaps how the Evidentia program is working out for me.