Methods of interview design

In this section, the method of semi structured interviewing will be discussed as well as the development of interview schedule and the discussion activities. Interviews have become increasingly common in research. For a rich and in-depth account, the interview has to be either unstructured or semi structured. An unstructured interview occurs when the interviewer will at the most use a few brief topics to prompt the interviewee, who is them allowed to respond however he or she wants. On the other hand, semi structured interview occurs when the interviewer is guided by a more detailed topic guide that usually contains some fairly specific questions to ask and likely ways of probing (Lee and Lings, 2008). This study used semi-structured interviews as it was optimal for collecting data on individuals’ personal histories, perspectives, and experiences, particularly when sensitive topics like occupational stress are explored. Again, since this study attempts to discover and/or refine theories and concepts, it was appropriate to make the interview less structured (Devers and Frankel, 2000). In the interest of simplicity, throughout this section, the first person is used and the term interview denotes semi structured interview.

As nicely put by Lofland and Lofland (1995:16): “... face to face interaction is the fullest condition of participating in the mind of another human being and ... you must participate in the mind of another human being to acquire social knowledge”. Because offshore work and issues of occupational stress in the Nigerian setting is rather an unexplored area, a semi structured interview is used to ensure a level of flexibility and encourage participants to express themselves. The use of interviews was thought to be valuable as it showcased the in depth characteristics of the situations, the meanings brought by participants and what is happening to them at the moment (Patton, 2002).

The idea behind this is to study things in their natural settings in an effort to discover the meanings seen by those who are being researched (or subjects) rather than that of the researcher which produces culturally specific and contextually rich data (Pope and Mays, 1995). These interviews looked in depth at the occupational stress encountered by offshore professionals in the Niger Delta considering the social, economic or political factors that may be affecting the way they experienced stress.

The first stage is a series of scoping interviews with eight (8) managers across four major Oil MNCs in the Niger Delta. The aim was to define the context of the case study analyses and understand the oil Industry in the Niger Delta as well as the roles of the oil MNCs over there.

The second stage of interview was with fourteen (14) offshore professionals, the aim was to discover the stress factors they identified with. The researcher was interested in the experiences of Niger Delta offshore workers in terms of occupational stress; therefore, it only made sense to use the managers and offshore workers in the oil companies in the Niger Delta in the investigation.

In targeting people to participate, some restrictions were given: for the management interview, it was necessary to use managers that were knowledgeable about workers and the business of oil exploration and production and also, in constant touch with staff and can response from the point of view of workers. Hence, Human resource managers, health and safety managers and Public relations managers were used. Regarding the workers interview, for the purpose of not having bias of getting varying responses due to different skill levels of workers, the study focused on offshore professional workers. In this study, a professional means a worker who has graduate or technical jobs while non-professionals are in the low skilled jobs e.g. cooks, washer men, cleaners etc.

In the interview process, the researcher tried to develop a sampling frame i.e. selecting sites and/or subjects capable of answering the research questions and securing their participation in the study as suggested by Devers and Frankel (2000). The site (offshore drilling and production installations located in the Niger Delta) was obvious and did not take time to decide; four of the top Oil multinational companies in the Niger Delta (comprising of EU owned, America Owned and Nigeria Owned) for the management interview and eight top oil multinational companies (comprising of EU owned, America Owned and Nigeria Owned) for the workers’ interview. There are usually two types of sampling techniques - probability and non-probability. In probability sampling, just as the name implies, everyone in the population has the same opportunity to get involved in the sample while in non-probability sampling, the features of the population are used in selecting subjects in the study (Corbetta, 2003). This study adopted a non-probability sampling strategy in determining who the subjects will be, by using snowballing and purposive techniques which enabled the researcher to select and study the case that can answer the research questions.

The researcher gained initial access to managers and workers through her personal and business links. Particularly, the researcher had in the past worked as a recruiter for top oil MNCs in Nigeria where she made key contacts with managers and offshore workers. These key contacts became gatekeepers throughout the data collection process as they incorporated

more respondents form their business links. The researcher later selected the respondents who were knowledgeable about the issues being investigated, willing to talk and representative of the range of points of view as suggested by Rubin and Rubin (1995). This process helped in getting the basic information and facilitating access to management staff and offshore workers in the desired organisations.

Table 3.1 - No. of respondents used in the case study Key

stakeholders of the case

Country Designation

No of respondents Role Designation

NNPC Nigerian 2 1 Human Resource manager; 1

Public Relations manager

SHELL EU 2 1 Human Resource Manager; 1

health and safety manager

TOTAL EU 2 1 Human Resource Manager; 1

health and safety manager

CHEVRON NON EU 2 2 Human Resource personnel

TOTAL 8

Regarding the management interview, a list of questions was developed in advance to explore their goals and strategies of business, the environment where they worked and how it impacted on them, the various stress factors faced by them, work life balance, health & safety and issues around employment relations. To achieve the main purpose of answering the research questions, the management interview questions were divided into 9 sections – background, about the firm, workforce diversity, stress, employment relations, health & safety, workplace skills, work life balance and environment hence, the analysis will be sectionalized accordingly in relation to stress. A schedule of the interview questions is included in the thesis (see Appendix). I observed that respondents felt comfortable and a sense of control while being interviewed in their offices but they were very careful in their utterances. This appeared to me, they did not want to give out information about their organizations and it made me support the little findings I got with secondary data, especially from organizations’ websites, industry reports, academic surveys, books and articles.

In relation to the workers interview, at the beginning of each interview, the researcher made sure she introduced herself as a research student from the University of Leeds Business School, gave her name and then explained the aim of the research to the respondents. This introduction was followed by asking the respondents to give a brief CV about themselves

thereby gathering more demographic information about them. This created a relaxed atmosphere to conduct the interview and facilitate the conversation with the respondent. The respondents were also assured of the confidentiality of the given information. A list of questions was developed in advance divided into 9 sections – demographical data, pay differentials, gender/ethnicity, work patter/expectation, workload, work-life interface, career prospects, safety and insecurity and work organization. The questions were put together from various sources, e.g. my further reading especially after getting little information from the management. These questions were validated by my supervisors to ascertain that they have the potential of answering the research questions.

Table 3.2 - Population of the workers’ Interview

s/n Gender Age Org. Marital

Status

State and Zone Position Work pattern Contract

status

1 Male 48 Shell Married Osun (South West) Pipeline Project

Engineer

Irregular Contract

2 Male 39 Chevron Married Ondo (South West) Electrical

Engineer

2 Wks on/off Permanent

3 Female 28 Schlumberger Single Enugu (South East) Field Engineer Irregular Contract

4 Male 32 Shell Single British Process

Engineer

4 wks on/off Contract

5 Male 32 Total Single Rivers (South South) Senior Pipeline

welding Inspector

2 wks on/off Permanent

6 Male 38 Schlumberger Married Kwara (North West) Senior

mechanical Engineer

Irregular Contract

7 Female 32 Chevron Married Anambra (South East) Senior pipeline

Engineer

2 wks on/off Permanent

8 Male 39 NNPC Married Enugu (Soutth East) Electrical

Engineer

s/n Gender Age Org. Marital Status

State and Zone Position Work pattern Contract

status

9 Male 43 Agip Married Oyo (South West) Process

Engineer

Irregular Contract

10 Male 37 Addax Married Ekiti (South West) Field Engineer 2 wks on/off Permanent

11 Male 30 Fegofs Single Kano (North East) Driller Irregular Contract

12 Male 42 Chevron Married Akwa Ibom (South

South)

Mechanical Engineer

2 wks on/off Contract

13 Male 46 Total Married Enugu (South East) Welding

Engineer

Irregular Contract

14 Male 36 NNPC Married Anambra (South East) Senior Drilling

Engineer

77 The use of interviews was thought to be valuable as it allowed access to the in depth characteristics of the situations, the meanings brought by participants and what is happening to them at the moment (Patton, 2002). The goal is to study things in their natural settings in an effort to discover the meanings seen by those who are being researched (or subjects) rather than that of the researcher which produces culturally specific and contextually rich data (Pope and Mays, 1995). Because offshore work and issues of occupational stress in the Nigerian setting is rather an unexplored area, an informal semi structured interview was used to ensure a level of flexibility and encourage participants to express themselves. These interviews looked in depth at stressors that might be experienced by offshore workers in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria. Leonard (2003) and Saunders et al., (2003) claim that participants may use words in a specific way that gives the researcher an opportunity to probe these connotations thereby, adds significance and depth to the data obtained and may also lead the discussion into areas the researcher had not considered earlier but are significant for understanding the study. In relation to the current study, an enhanced understanding of labour market, geographical and socioeconomic disconnectedness as they relate to occupation stress will be achieved.

For both management and workers’ interviews, interviews took place in either the respondents' company onshore premises or homes and lasted between 40-60 minutes. The respondents did not want the interview to be recorded so the researcher was only allowed to take notes hence; hand- written notes of the respondents' responses were taken all through the interview and notes were transcribed by the researcher. In the interest of having a complete and accurate account, the transcription was verbatim. Prior to the interview, respondents’ consent was sought through letters (It asked respondents to indicate their interest as regards the interview and also choose the date/time and venue of the interview, and provide contact details) and the respondents were reminded of their rights to withdraw at any time of the study or to feel free not answering uncomfortable questions. Then the interview sessions were scheduled and held as planned. Finally, they were all thanked deeply and promised to be given copies of the final research findings.

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