Justification on research strategy

According to Churchill and lacobucci (2007: p.77), exploratory study is used to increase the analyst’s familiarity with the problem. It is appropriate for any problem about which little is known and is used for any of the following purposes:

4- Formulating a problem for more precise investigation or developing hypotheses. 4" Establishing priorities for firture research.

4" Gathering information about the practical problems of carrying out relevant research.

4- Clarifying concepts.

From the technical perspective, exploratory study usually means qualitative research, and vice versa. Churchill and lacobucci (2007: p.76) suggest that literature search, experience survey, case analysis, focus groups, in-depth interview, projective test and ethnographies are basic types of exploratory study. Easterby-Smith et al. (1995:p.73) suggest that in-depth interviewing is the most fundamental of all qualitative methods. It is one of three main qualitative interview formats. The other two are informal conversation (unstructured interview) and standardised open-ended interview (Knox and Burkard, 2009; Turner, 2012). In-depth interviewing aims to understand something from the subject’s point of view and to uncover the meaning of their experiences (Kvale, 1996). Robson (2002: p.59) also points out that in exploratory study, an in-depth interview can be very helpful to find out what is happening and to seek new insights. A semi-structured interview may also be used in relation to an exploratory study. An in-depth interview provides the opportunity to ‘probe’ answers where you want your interviewees to explain, or build on, their responses (Saunders

et al., 2003). The importance of (in-depth) interview is summarised by Burgess (cited in

Easterby-Smith et al., 1995): ‘The interview is . ...the opportunity for the researcher to probe deeply to uncover new clues, open up new dimensions of a problem and to secure vivid, accurate inclusive accounts that are based on personal experience.’ Conducting in-depth interviews will enable researchers to obtain insights related to how individuals construct the

G. Ma 2013 Chapter 5 Methodology

meaning and significance of their situations firom the complex personal framework of beliefs and values. More recently, Rao and Perry (2007: p.87) have suggested that the convergent interview has special advantages for enterprise research. Convergent interviewing is a series of in-depth interviews with experts that allow the researchers to refine the questions after each interview, to converge on the issues in a topic area. The following provides more discussion on using in-depth interviewing as a research strategy for Study 1.

5.5.2.1 Natures of in-depth interviewing

In-depth interviewing is one of three most often used qualitative research strategies in business research; the other two are focus group and case research (Rao and Perry, 2007). Participant observation is also one of the main qualitative research methods. However, it is not much used in business and management research (Saunders et al., 2012: p342). Table 5.3 shows the differences between the most frequently used qualitative research methods in enterprise research. Easterby-Smith et al. (1995:p.73) suggest that in-depth interviewing is most fundamental of all qualitative methods. Such interviews are conversations with

Qualitative method Characteristics

In-depth interviews Case study Focus groups

Main objective To obtain rich information M ainly theory Group interaction and understanding about the building/confirming

respondent’s “world”.

Process Flexible: semi-structured or Structured and standard Flexible: unstructured

unstructured procedures to structured

Content Unstructured to structured Somewhat structured Unstructured Strengths Replication Replication effect in a group Synergistic

setting

W eaknesses Results may be biased Requirement o f sufficient Confirming effect in a prior theory group setting

Sources: Adapted from Rao and Perry (2007).

structure and purpose that are defined and controlled by the researcher. Although the research interview may not lead to objective information, it captures many of the subject’s views on a topic. That is why the basic subject matter is not, as in qualitative research, object data, but consists of meaningful relations to be interpreted (Kvale, 1996). Conducting in-depth interviews will enable researchers to obtain insights related to how individuals construct the meaning and significance of their situations from the complex

G. Ma 2013 Chapter 5 Methodology

personal framework of beliefs and values. The in-depth interview allows the respondent to identify and describe concerns or concepts that may not have been anticipated or considered by the researchers (Curry et ah, 2009).

5.5.2.2 Types of in-depth interview:

In-depth interviews are usually semi-structured or unstructured (Robson, 2002:59; Saunders et al., 2012). In a semi-structured interview the researchers prepare a list of themes and possibly some key questions to be covered and enable comparison across eases (Knox and Burkard, 2009). The interviewer has open-ended questions on which to focus discussion rather than a list of closed questions. They are usually carried out on a one-to-one basis. Unstructured interviews are those cases where there is no predetermined list of questions to work with (Saunders, et al., 2012). However, Easterby-Smith et al. (1995) suggest that researchers do need a framework from which to begin to plot out the developing themes but they should not be ‘tied up by them’. It is considered that a semi-structured interview might be better and more cost effective to avoid superficial exchange of information when using an extreme ‘non-direetive’ or ‘open’ interview.

5.5.2.3 Advantages and limitations

The primary advantage of in-depth interviews is that they provide much more detailed information than what is available through other data collection methods, such as surveys. They also may provide a more relaxed atmosphere in which to collect information: people may feel more comfortable having a conversation with interviewers as opposed to filling out a survey (Boyee and Neale, 2006). However, there are a few limitations and pitfalls: complexity (it requires highly experienced researchers with specific skills, including the ability to establish rapport with respondents, to use discussion guides flexibly and to use probes and follow-up questions to draw out responses, according to Curry et al. (2009), interview bias (i.e. the interviewers might want to ‘prove’ that their own reference frame is working, so their interview responses might be biased), time-intensive, and not generalisable (where small samples are chosen and random sampling methods are not used. However, it provides valuable information for research, particularly when supplementing other methods of data collection). Avoiding “leading” the respondents is a main concern

G. Ma 2013 ... Chapter 5 Methodology

with such research strategy and one of the main reasons why high levels of interviewer skills are needed (Easterby-Smith et al., 1995; Boyce and Neale, 2006; Saunders et al, 2012).

Due to laek of evidence whether cultural values influence marketing characteristies of SMEs and whether these MCs are meaningful, this study has an exploratory nature. It is one of the important reasons why this research used in-depth interviewing as research strategy. More reasons for the decision are: first, due to extreme lack of previous research findings related to socio-cultural influence on marketing practices of CEs and JVs, this research used in-depth interviews allowing the researcher to refine the questions, elements and contents of the research framework and instrument; second, in China, it is not practical to call a group of CEO/Chief marketing managers together in a meeting without business purpose/benefits or government authority. However, individually they are more accessible by using personal relationships. Therefore, in Study 1, in-depth personal interviews were used for the purpose of obtaining meaningful initial perspectives on and knowledge of the marketing activities and their characteristics of CEs and JVs as well as the socio-cultural influence factors. In addition, this research’s target respondents are the CEOs or chief marketing managers of CEs and JVs, who do have strong beliefs and determining sense (Currant and Blackburn, 2001). It is quite possible that the conversations would drift away from the research concerns. Therefore, it is suitable to use a semi-structured in-depth

interview strategy to access the respondents for the first step of research.