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    Conceptual Frameworks: A Guide to Structuring Analyses, Decisions and Presentations
    Conceptual Frameworks: A Guide to Structuring Analyses, Decisions and Presentations
    Conceptual Frameworks: A Guide to Structuring Analyses, Decisions and Presentations
    Ebook134 pages1 hour

    Conceptual Frameworks: A Guide to Structuring Analyses, Decisions and Presentations

    By Chinmay Kakatkar

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    About this ebook

    Conceptual Frameworks can help you structure complex analyses, make better decisions and deliver persuasive presentations. This is the first book of its kind to bring together the most common framework types in a single, quick and easy-to-use guide to framework-building.

    The framework types discussed in this book are:
    * Hierarchies (or tree diagrams) for drilling down into problems to identify key drivers.
    * Matrices (including the 2x2 matrix and larger multidimensional tables) for comparing factors and analyzing trade-offs.
    * Processes (linear and iterative) for mapping out and executing plans.
    * Relationships for representing transactions, membership, and causal and correlational links among people and other entities.

    In Conceptual Frameworks you will learn how to snap together a small set of "building blocks" (framework types and dimensions) to come up with useful frameworks for your particular situation. The concepts described in this book have been validated time and again in academia and industry in the past.

    The combination of straightforward explanations, examples of relatable real-life applications, prompts for the reader, and collection of top tips and further reading makes Conceptual Frameworks a practically relevant reference for everyone - from students that want to become more insightful and achieve better grades, to professionals that want to become more effective and boost their careers.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBooks on Demand
    Release dateNov 20, 2018
    ISBN9783752869798
    Conceptual Frameworks: A Guide to Structuring Analyses, Decisions and Presentations
    Author

    Chinmay Kakatkar

    Dr. Chinmay Kakatkar is passionate about helping others derive value from data. Professionally, he has worked closely with companies from a range of different industries to tackle strategic business problems using a combination of conceptual frameworks and data science. His PhD research at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich focused on network analysis. He also has a BEng in Computing from Imperial College London, and an MPhil in Technology Policy from the University of Cambridge.

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      Book preview

      Conceptual Frameworks - Chinmay Kakatkar

      Conceptual Frameworks

      CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORKS

      Dedication

      Introduction

      Part I: A Three-Step Approach

      Chapter 1: Step One - Define the Framework’s Objective

      Chapter 2: Step Two - Identify the Framework Type and Dimensions

      Chapter 3: Step Three - Combine the Framework Type and Dimensions

      Part II: Framework Types and Dimensions

      Chapter 4: Hierarchical Frameworks

      Chapter 5: Matrix Frameworks

      Chapter 6: Process Frameworks

      Chapter 7: Relational Frameworks

      Chapter 8: Framework Dimensions

      Part III: Over to You

      Chapter 9: Top Tips for Making Conceptual Frameworks

      Chapter 10: Supplementary Reading

      Afterword and Acknowledgements

      About the Author

      Copyright

      CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORKS

      A Guide to Structuring Analyses,

      Decisions and Presentations

      Chinmay Kakatkar

      BoD – Books on Demand Verlag

      Dedication

      To my parents

      Introduction

      Frameworks are everywhere. If you are reading this book, there is a good chance that you have already come across a framework at some point in your life so far – and it is hardly surprising. A framework is basically a tool for organizing things. A lot of the things we do in our personal and professional lives need to be organized in some way, and frameworks can help us do just that.

      This book is specifically about conceptual frameworks, which are essentially analytical structures for representing abstract concepts. It is a lot less scary than it may sound. Think of all the times that you (could) have considered the benefits and risks or the short-term and long-term consequences before deciding to do something. These are common examples of high-level, conceptual frameworks that we can use in order to structure our thoughts better and improve our decision-making. Of course, we may often use simple frameworks without explicitly pointing them out. In fact, you are only likely to hear people actually use the word framework in a work-related environment, where it may be especially important to describe – and defend – your thought process.

      The great thing about conceptual frameworks is that they can help you turn abstract thoughts that exist in your mind into concrete, tangible products that other people can see and appreciate. This can be especially important for the so-called knowledge workers among us, whose jobs involve collecting, analyzing and deriving conclusions from data. If you are reading this book, you are probably also a knowledge worker. To paraphrase the famous management guru Peter Drucker, it is data that enables knowledge workers to do their job, but it is the ability to meaningfully organize this data that leads to a job well done. As such, conceptual frameworks may be relevant to you on roughly four levels:

      Understanding frameworks: At the most basic level, you should be able to understand the frameworks that someone else presents. You could be sitting in a classroom at school, or a meeting at work, when someone presents a framework. Rather than getting confused and tuning out, you should be able to at least get the gist of the framework and have some appreciation of its relevance to the point that the presenter is trying to make.

      Applying frameworks: At the next level, merely understanding frameworks may not be enough – you may be required to actually apply them. Perhaps you have to make a strategic decision, write a report, or deliver a presentation to an audience. Using an existing framework can help you structure your decisions and make your communication more effective.

      Evaluating frameworks: At a more advanced level, you may have to critically evaluate a framework. This could happen when you are checking over some else’s work to ensure that their arguments make sense. You could also be looking at different frameworks, and have to choose the one that best fits your current needs.

      Building frameworks: Finally, at an even higher level, you may find the need to actually build a framework yourself. Maybe the existing frameworks are not directly applicable to your particular situation, or maybe coming up with a new, custom framework is your task in itself.

      The aim of this book is to provide you with an easy-to-understand guide to building conceptual frameworks. Ideally, in the process of learning how to build frameworks, you should also become better at understanding, applying and evaluating frameworks. The next sections of the book are structured as follows. In Part I, you will see a simple, three-step approach to building conceptual frameworks. In brief, the three steps are:

      1. Defining the framework’s objective

      2. Identifying the right building blocks (i.e., the framework type and the framework dimensions)

      3. Putting the building blocks together in an effective manner to answer the framework’s objective

      These steps form an iterative process, and you may find yourself cycling through them a few times before you get the framework just right. In the author’s experience, the three-step approach has proven itself in numerous real-life scenarios across academia and industry. For example, students and researchers can use the approach to structure their coursework and analyses (e.g., as essays, reports, or presentations), while managers in industry can also benefit from the flexibility afforded by the approach to frame strategic problems and justify their decision-making.

      Part II covers Steps 2 and 3 (identifying and combining the building blocks of the framework) in more detail, since this can be especially overwhelming for those who have little practice in making frameworks. I understand what the framework is supposed do, they might say, but how should I actually lay it out? Is it a matrix, a tree, a flowchart? What should the dimensions of the framework represent? And how do I put it all together? There are different options to choose from and combine, but few resources out there that cut through the noise and tell you how it can be done. As such, the focus of Part II is on the most common framework types and dimensions that can be used to structure the vast majority of analytical projects in practice.

      Finally, Part III rounds off the book by leaving you with a set of top tips for building conceptual frameworks that serve your current situation and can also be reused in the future. These tips are really a consolidation of the things you will have learned throughout the previous sections of the book. Additionally, Part III also includes a curated list of resources for further reading. These resources might cover a particular framework type or dimension in more detail, or the process of framework-building more generally, or they might be a repository of frameworks that are especially well-known in practice.

      At the time of writing, this is possibly the first book of its kind to bring together different framework types and dimensions in a single, coherent discussion about framework-building. The combination of simple explanations of concepts and examples of real-life applications pitched at a broad audience (including students and professionals across domains) also makes this book a practically relevant piece of reference.

      Of course, just reading this book will not immediately make you a pro at building frameworks – for that, you will have to actually start applying the things covered in this book to your own setting. To help you along, each chapter in Parts I and II (the meat of the book) is structured with the practical application in mind. Each chapter starts with a brief overview of the concept being discussed, keeping the language as simple as possible. Next, we get real and explain the concepts using real examples to help you see how they can actually be applied, as well as their benefits and limitations. Finally, each chapter ends with a summary of the key takeaways, and a set of questions prompting the reader to think of applications in their own setting. The aim

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