The detailed mapping of each primary informant interviewed provided information on the various texts that were coordinating the actions of the NPs and NP candidates, and provided guidance on where to go next. As with most ethnographic inquiries there has been an abundance of data generated, and multiple opportunities to pursue various institutional practices. Indeed, I have spent many days pursuing a particular series of texts, only to decide that I was losing sight of the purpose of the study, or the standpoint of the primary informants.
Clune (2011) developed an acronym, INSPECT, based upon a range of authors’ works, that I found particularly helpful:
I: What is Interesting about this map?
N: Are there New findings that require a revision in the methods, interview questions or procedures?
S: What Sequences of action or work are evident? P: Who are the People identified in this map?
E: Are there other Events that are influencing the sequence that may be (in)visible to others?
C: Are there Common Connections or Circumstances with this map and experiences of other informants?
T: What Texts are talked about?
(Clune, 2011, p. 62)
Choosing the disjunctures to pursue was a challenging process. An IE researcher is often immersed in the field for a considerable time before identifying the entry point(s) to the IE, particularly if the experience is complex (Bisaillon, 2012; DeVault & McCoy, 2012).
130 However, I returned frequently to the purpose of an IE being to create a map of a particular area of the social world, by placing a magnifying glass over that area to show the coordinating effects of the institutional processes (Smith, 2005). I have restricted my focus for further analysis to exploring tensions expressed by the primary informants that remain contemporary. Textual analysis, and identifying and interviewing secondary informants, was based upon exploring particular tensions and disjunctures arising from the primary informant interviews.
The first part of textual analysis is to identify texts that have been enacted by the primary informant. I use an example here of an experienced nurse in primary health care who needed to demonstrate achievement of specific NP competencies for her portfolio. I have used italics and bold to highlight what was said, and below identify the particular texts to which she referred:
[A]nd it feels like you’ve done this huge drop, and you’re starting at Kindy [child care] all over again. I don’t know how to explain it really.... at least you felt like that – you just know that there’s so much more that you have to do,
but you start worrying about, like, the leadership side of things and
policies and procedures and… the business side(1) of things a little more
than what I would have any other time. This year I joined the Leadership
Nursing Group (1) .... I wish they had been around three years ago – that would have been awesome, because they’re all really either senior nurses or management, and it’s [the group’s] just got all the answers [such as]
where all the funding comes from…. It’s a new group that just started this
year, but they’ve been really good. [Name] - she’s our Director of Nursing at
the hospital. So it was just for the whole community –we’ve got primary
health care nurses, mental health nurses, all community nurses to start joining together and linking in with each other, you know, on a leadership level to do well for the patients really in [our district] (2).
131 The first highlighted quote (1) directly connects the primary informant with the authoritative text. She knows the Nursing Council competencies34 for the NP scope of practice, and has engaged with the text. In essence, she had a dialogue with the text, and her resultant action, or work process, was to join the Leadership Nursing Group. Smith (Smith, 2006a) refers to this as the text-reader conversation, shown in the following diagram:
The primary informant knew about the Nursing Council text, a reproducible text. Further the primary informant links leadership with working with other nurses for the benefit of the community (highlighted 2). Here she is connecting with the extra-local layers of institutional discourse and texts, perhaps, for example, nurses’ work to reduce health inequalities, and the importance of working collaboratively. She identifies that the Director of Nursing (DoN), who set the group up, is herself hooked into the institutional ruling of the DHB. Through this group, the primary informant gained access to other authoritative texts, such as funding streams that would give her the knowledge to develop a business case for her employment. This one example of an interview shows how the researcher could further the inquiry by exploring texts governing nurse’s work and leadership, as well as
34 The competencies changed in 2017. NPs are expected to demonstrate advanced interpersonal,
leadership, and management skills (Nursing Council of New Zealand, 2017c), however, the requirement to demonstrate leadership competencies outside of the clinical area is no longer required.
Map 6: Diagram showing the text-reader conversation. Adapted from Smith (2012)
132 undertaking an interview with the DoN (a secondary informant) to explore the text-based work process of the establishment of the leadership group.