This article states that you need three things to accomplish any project, either planned or unplanned: time, money, and (human) resources. Actually, there is a second critical resource, i.e. information. Granted, human resources can provide a certain amount of expertise, and should be used whenever practical, but only as an adjunct to a comprehensive literature search; not as a substitute.
The discipline of chemistry is extraordinarily blessed with a superb aggregation of the world's chemical literature, going back into the 19th century, in the form of Chemical Abstracts. Furthermore, that entire aggregation is available in electronic form for searching. ACS does not do enough to promote this as the go-to resource for all problem-solving and decision-making.
