New Focus at the Research Foundation.

• Position: Brief Article

FEI's Research Foundation, long known as the publisher of full-length studies on a wide range of financial management topics, has a new focus.

Gracie Hemphill, Director of Research, says the Foundation's goals are to be more proactive in its work, more responsive to FEI members' demands for quicker, easier access to information and to offer more diverse products and services. "In a relatively short period of time, we have added a critical on-line dimension to our work, with full-text Web access to our traditionally paper-bound studies as well as Web-based summaries and FAQs. We've made the projects in the research pipeline more dynamic by posting preliminary results and related data on www.ferf.org as the project develops."

This new approach has created opportunities for other initiatives such as teleconferences with study participants, articles for FE Magazine (see page 47) and co-sponsored conferences such as Benchmarking the Quality of Earnings, planned with the AICPA for Spring 2001 in New York City.

A new service Hemphill believes holds great potential is Ask the FEI Librarian, an on-line, customized search service to answer members' questions on financial management and other business topics. As traffic to the site grows, the research staff will build a searchable...