RESEARCH INSIDE WORK ORGANIZATIONS: focus groups expert interviews

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RESEARCH INSIDE WORK ORGANIZATIONS focus
groups expert interviews

• INFO 272. Qualitative Research Methods
• 17 March 2009

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Schedule
Thursday 3.19.09 guest speaker Elisa Oreglia (
I will return assignment 1) Spring Break Tue
3.24.09 and Thu 3.26.09 Tuesday after spring
break come prepared to discuss your interviews
have at least one completed One week later,
Tuesday (4.7.09) Assignment 2 is due
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Overview

• One-on-one interviews
• Projective interviews (introducing artifacts
  i.e. photos or tasks to generate rich data)
• TODAY
• Group interviews and focus groups
• Expert interviews as a subcategory of interviewing

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Focus groups

• Very popular in marketing research
• 8-10 people typically strangers
• A trained facilitator
• Opinions about a new (or existing) product or
  service
• Two-way mirror so management can observe

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Focus groups

• an especially nice situation for revealing
  variations in perspectives and attitude and a
  ready means, through subtle pitting of one
  against the other, for distinguishing between
  shared and variable perspectives. schatzman and
  strauss 1973

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Focus groups

• Can be ego-centric (would I buy this?)
• Can be object-oriented (how are factory processes
  organized and carried out?)
• Can be collaborative, consensus-driven (what
  health care services are most needed within this
  community?)

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The standard criticism

• Tendency to conform around particular views
• Often one member is domineering
• Professional respondents

Artificiality voicing views and experiences
among strangers in a conference room
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Solomon Asch on conformity (1952)
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Addressing conformity problems

• Some Techniques
• Nominal Group Technique write down ideas about
  a topic and then read and discuss
• Delphi Method write down response, collected by
  the facilitator, posted for public reading, then
  discussed.

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Addressing conformity problems

• Who not to put in a group
• Boss and subordinate
• Who else??
• On sensitive topics
• Create more homogenous groups (all HIV people,
  all men, etc.)
• Combine focus groups with individual interviews

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Addressing artificiality problems

• Using existing groups (rather than strangers)
• Families
• Social organizations
• videos observe social dynamics

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Next Topic
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Different forms of Interviewing

• The object of interest may be
• An event (use narrative interviews)
• An individual (use in-depth individual
  interviews)
• An issue and the range of views about it
  (individual or group interviews)
• A complex process or system (use expert
  interviews)

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What is an Expert?

• Person who is responsible for the development,
  implementation or control of solutions/strategies/
  policies
• Person who has privileged access to information
  about groups or decision processes
• Meuser Nagel

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Expert interviews advantages

• Tend to not worry as much about swaying their
  responses can challenge them
• Can be highly motivated and interested in your
  understanding the process/problem often like to
  talk
• May be well networked help you find other
  contacts

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Expert interviews disadvantages

• Embedded in power relations. Those in powerful
  positions who take up the role of expert may
  have a vested interest in preserving the status
  quo. May conceal or fail to disclose certain
  relevant, important matters.
• Short on time, hard to schedule meetings with.

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Expert interviews Interviewers role

• Dress professionally
• Come prepared (prior reading on technical
  subjects, basic terminology, specific questions
  on things you dont quite understand)

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Expert interviews Interviewers role

• Types of Interaction, interviewer as
• Co-expert
• Expert outside the field
• Lay person
• Authority
• Confederate
• Possible critic
• Bogner and Menz

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In Summary

• Social dynamics in group interviews potentially
  a strength but also can be a liability
• Ways of managing conformity problems
• Ways of managing artificiality of the focus group
  situation
• Expert interviews more preparation required,
  interactional dynamics may vary substantially
  from other forms of interviewing