Justification for a Qualitative Methodology

Qualitative research is an integral element of the ‘interpretivist’ approach and historically has been viewed upon as an outcast in strategic and broader management research (Whittington, 2006). Qualitative research concerns gaining a subjective understanding of constructs in a more in-depth style than the dominating format of quantitative research (Bryman, 2012). Research in this study’s domain has been split into one of three groups: deductive, inductive or abductive research (Eisenhardt & Graebner, 2007). Authors have found that the use of these different research designs (deductive, inductive and abductive) through the case study approach can serve different objectives. This study employs an abductive research design8. Abductive methodologies

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‘The abductive approach is to be seen as different from a mixture of deductive and inductive approaches. An abductive approach is fruitful if the researcher’s objective is to discover new things — other variables and other relationships’ (Dubois & Gadde, 2002, p. 559).

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have been a popular form of research with scholars arguing that going in and out of theories in respect of empirical data allows a more holistic form of knowledge to be created (Dubois & Gibbert, 2010). Debate exists concerning whether certain qualitative studies that claim to be ‘case study’ research should in fact be justified as truly meeting that term; this is after noting the stated justification of the robustness of procedures undertaken in certain published work (Welch et al., 2011). Gray (2004) suggests it is a way of understanding and exploring phenomena beyond cause and effect relationships; moreover, that it is a useful when exploring multiple perspectives. Welch et al. (2011) outline the approaches taken by leading authors that advocate a case study approach and derive a 2 x 2 matrix. This current study draws on the approach advocated by Stake (1995) who mentions three types of case study.

This study addresses what Stake (1995) considers as the single ‘instrumental case study’; this focuses on a single issue or problem and then identifies a single case to explore the issue. It is therefore different to what Stake (1995) views as the ‘collective case study’ i.e. that uses multiple cases with the aim of understanding a single phenomenon. The current study focuses on the Wairarapa wine cluster and so is not a collective case study that would suggest other clusters are being compared. It is different to what Stake (1995) sees as the ‘intrinsic case study’; this focuses on the case itself and is used to learn about that particular case in-depth rather than as a vehicle to explore wider issues. In the intrinsic case study, an example might be investigating a specific organisational restructuring or similar event and hence again is not applicable in the current study. Whilst other studies examining the case study approach have set the boundaries of their case studies as the firm-level and have analysed them using a cross- case comparison (Lindgreen, 2001 a), the firms in this study are simply actors in exploring the single case of the Wairarapa cluster. The propositions developed within the literature review are set at the firm-level to examine how the actors (Wairarapa vineyards) are collaborating within the boundaries of the single instrumental case study. This ultimately contributes to investigating the study’s primary objective i.e. is collaboration a threshold or dynamic capability?

The context in which a case study (or studies) exists is a fundamental aspect to this particular methodological approach and hence there is an importance of setting a ‘boundary’ (Stake, 1995). Indeed, Stake (1995) suggests that one of the pitfalls of case study research is when the particular researcher attempts to make the study achieve too

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much as it loses focus. Triangulation within the boundary that is set is an important aspect of case study methodology where the researcher collects data from multiple sources and explores multiple perspectives (Denscombe, 2007); also, to clarify meanings in a case study (Stake, 1995). It provides credibility and data may be viewed as more trustworthy where there are several sources of information (Stake, 1995; Yin, 2014).

Denscombe (2007) suggests that triangulation is based on the laws of geometry whereby it enables the location of a point to be exactly determined based on two other positions. Despite the reference to three points of view in the triangulation process, depending on the data available, some studies suggest that two, or in some cases, more than three perspectives is an acceptable form of the triangulation process and allows scholars to add rigour to their research by exploring multiple viewpoints (Homburg et

al., 2012). It is important to recognise that this is not always possible due to the nature

of data collected in a case study, e.g. different peoples’ knowledge of events or indeed what is published in secondary sources. Despite this, different perspectives offer an alternative view of reality (Denzin, 1989). The process adds to the rigour of an investigation by offering a holistic perspective which supports the findings and hence credibility (Miles and Huberman, 1994). Where possible, Yin (2014) suggests that a convergence of data from different sources allows a researcher to determine the consistency of the findings.

The rigour of research was conventionally judged on the basis of issues such as validity, reliability, generalisability and objectivity (Denscombe, 2007). These terms imply a somewhat quantitative perspective as in fact does the term ‘sampling’ in respect of data collection. There appears to be inconsistency across studies with some qualitative research using terms such as ‘validity’ and ‘reliability’, while others use alternative terms that they see as more appropriate to qualitative studies. Lincoln & Guba (1985) suggest four criteria, namely credibility, dependability, confirmability and transferability. Guba & Lincoln (1994) added authenticity although this arguably has received less attention in qualitative investigations. This current investigation recognises this ongoing debate in the existing methodological literature and does not intend to unify thoughts on the topic as that is not the aim of the study. The methodological approach undertaken was a means to an end (achieving the research

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objective) and not an end in itself; this chapter provides a commentary to justify the approach undertaken to improve validity, reliability and overall credibility.

Debate exists in the literature in respect of what forms the ‘boundary’ of case study research? In this investigation, the boundary was collaboration strategies in the Wairarapa wine cluster in NZ. The firms within this cluster that granted interviews formed only a sample of the population; as this chapter will proceed to explain, it was considered that the percentage of participants (23.33%) was representative to understand the nature of the case study. The percentage accumulated was only one facet of the sample; another key factor involved the characteristics of the sample. These key characteristics are described further in later sections of the methodology. The fact that diminishing returns of new information was obtained suggested a point of theoretical saturation was reached. Zikmund et al. (2013) notes that theoretical saturation and representativeness are different matters as some samples can have the diminishing returns effect of theoretical saturation but it may be too small to be a sufficient inference on the population. For this study, the population (as defined by the boundary of the case study) was the Wairarapa wine cluster. Representativeness was confirmed by triangulating the interview data with other sources to boost the level confidence in the findings (Denzin & Lincoln, 2005). This was especially relevant given that when possible, interviews were combined with observation and triangulation with secondary sources that will be outlined later in this chapter.

The case study utilised data from individual firms (or vineyards) as ‘actors’ within the Wairarapa cluster as a whole. The triangulation procedure adopted suggested the data had the necessary depth to justify the term ‘case study’ within the investigation’s boundary (the Wairarapa wine cluster). In the following chapter, largely aggregated results will be presented in respect of firms in the cluster rather than in their own right to allow data to be compared and contrasted. This is apart from summary data to classify each firm in relation to both demographic characteristics and core aspects of strategy undertaken in respect of the objectives of this study. The ‘how and why’ nature of qualitative research is brought out by comparing these firms (within a 2 x 2 matrix in the discussion chapter) as actors to help explore and explain the collaboration (both coopetition and co-creation) strategies of the Wairarapa cluster/case study. These methodological considerations will be discussed in their own right in individual sections within this chapter. Although broader strategy research has been dominated by positivist

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logic, the use of the case study method was adopted on the basis that the wine sector has been studied through a range of methodologies but the case study method appears be the most popular (Hall & Mitchell, 2000). This study is merely continuing this trend of popular methodologies relative to this study’s context to address ‘how and why’ issues as opposed to numerical data.