Chapter 3 Methodology
3.2 My Case Study
In this section I explain the choice of my case study company, and how I gained access to it.
3.2.1 My Rationale For My Choice Of The Case Study Firm
Fieldwork for this explanatory single-case study was conducted in the EWS plant of CompCo in Southern India from August 2008 until the first week of June 2009. EWS and CompCo are pseudonyms of the case study plant and company respectively. CompCo is a leading commercial vehicle manufacturing firm in India, which, during the fieldwork period, was in the process of implementing major changes within its plants which seemed to me to be likely to be of significant interest.At that juncture, I wanted to understand how commercial vehicle manufacturing companies in India were reacting to the dominant paradigm of change management in the automotive industry, which was lean manufacturing. I also wanted to examine the challenges corporate and plant management encountered and to explore the
understandings and outcomes for workers and managers in a company that had a
difficult industrial relations history. Studying change management in the initial stages of its implementation and institutionalisation had an advantage over studying the effects in companies that had already institutionalised lean manufacturing to an advanced degree and where those effects are well documented in the literature [Rinehart et al., 1997]. The
choice of CompCo was advantageous because I was able to observe an evolving corporate strategy, the outlooks and interactions of workers and managers, and the measures they accepted or rejected, the changes in their work routines and the labour processes being imposed upon them. I hoped that extrapolation of the findings from this firm, which has been a dominant player in the commercial vehicle sector in India, would illuminate the challenges of implementing managerial strategies of change management in the changing commercial vehicle manufacturing sector in India.
My other reasons for choosing CompCo as a case study firm were entirely
pragmatic. One of its main production sites is in Hubli, a town an hour and half away by bus from my family’s home, and where I could live during fieldwork. Recording and storing my data at home meant I could be sure of maintaining its security and
confidentiality. Moreover, I had spent the best part of my childhood in Bangalore, India so I knew the area fairly well. As important, I had a connection to the company through my uncle, who had worked at CompCo and still had acquaintances there.
3.2.2 Gaining access
The difficulties of getting management’s agreement to pursue fieldwork have been well documented in the literature. As Morell et al. [1997] observe, the start of any
ethnographic study begins with a search for gatekeepers and the simple question, “Whose approval do we need to obtain in order to conduct our research in this organisation?” Identifying gatekeepers is also useful in providing pointers to the structure of an organisation and may help to clarify differences and similarities in the agendas of the researcher and the gatekeepers [Morell et al., 1999: 58]. Moreover, since gaining access is a continuing process, it involves continually explaining the research agenda to
The preparations for my fieldwork commenced with a letter from my academic supervisor to the HR Director at CompCo corporate headquarters in April 2008. Initially, the Director was reluctant to grant permission to allow me to study one of CompCo’s plants. At that stage, there was some discussion as to whether a study of a plant in Hubli manufacturing motor cycles, TVS, might be more productive than a study of the
commercial vehicle plant. TVS had a long standing collaboration with the Warwick Manufacturing Group. A Professor there introduced me to the HR manager of TVS. However, in the TVS plant was at an advanced stage of impelementing the process of lean manufacturing and also had a waning trade union voice. This made TVS less attractive as a case study site because I wanted to study how trade unions receive lean manufacturing from the beginning and in any case, I was unsure whether I would get sufficient access to pursue participants over an extended period or be able to plumb the managerial networks at TVS,
However, a relative of mine who had worked in a senior position as GM in CompCo and who had retired recently succeeded in convincing Mr. N, who was heading the company’s change management programme, to allow me to carry out my fieldwork study in the company. Mr. N believed that my research could provide
valuable insights into the effectiveness of CompCo’s change management programme, which could help him in managing the process and deciding on what he described as “course corrections”. Mr. N’s views convinced corporate management to grant me permission to start my fieldwork initially at WAP4, although eventually I ended up spending almost all of my time at EWS, which became my field site.
The kinds of data available to researchers are dependent on the access they obtain and the position they adopt in carrying out their research. Initially, it was clear to me that I needed to establish my credibility with management, who were sensitive to any
the data I needed. Nevertheless, as my research progressed I found that as management began to treat me more as an established part of the social fabric of the plant I was able to use the freedom of movement I had gained to establish a network of contacts and interact with workers. As I discuss further below, much depends on obtaining a role in the case study setting that allows one to meet and talk with people in the setting on a regular basis. However, any particular role will also have drawbacks, insofar as it limits the scope of where the researcher can go and whom he or she can talk to. A particularly good example here is Milkman’s [1997] study of the impact of technology on workers and workers’ rights in the US car industry. She was able to obtain access to an automobile plant only because at the time, the United Automobile Workers union wanted to study the impact of new technology on the job security of its members and approached Milkman asking for her help [Milkman, 1997: 192]. Although the two had different agendas, there was a confluence of interests and using its relationship with the employer, the UAW was able to secure access to the company. Milkman was therefore able to gain the access that she needed for her research in return for providing a study of how the union’s recently negotiated job security programme functioned; something at that point that the implementation of new technologies had triggered.
As identified by Milkman [1997: 197], the researcher’s agenda will usually not be in exact congruence with what the company would expect or hope would be
delivered and this was true in my case study. I wanted to interpret and understand what change management would mean to operators and middle managers, whereas the company wanted me to help them assess first their change management programme and later their inventory reduction project. For me to gain the access and trust needed to obtain a deep understanding of the effects of lean manufacturing driven change, I had to show a coalescence between my research agenda and the interests of plant management and its perception of what a student’s research project ought to contain. As I discuss
further below the role given me by management, while providing access to managers limited my access to and possibly credibility with workers.