The Semi-Structured Interview

The semi-structured interview, consisting of questions that the respondents can answer freely (Morse, 1992), helps the researcher to gather participants’

responses in breadth and depth. This data is reported as narrative containing direct quotations from interview statements and fieldnotes. It confers a sense of reality, describing accurately what the informants feel, perceive and how they behave (Burns, 2000). In this research, interviews investigated the individual’s experience and context, to achieve specific perspectives from respondents. The researcher gave respondents the opportunity to express all related views, supported debate and exploration, and was able to elicit additional information by probing and discussing answers (Morse, 1992). Consequently, this method also allows the researcher to interview the informants comprehensively by following key themes that need to be explored. Further, the researcher asked each respondent the same questions in the same order to ensure that the interview data from one participant could be compared with the responses of others.

6.2 Pilot Study

Because the semi-structured interview is flexible, the researcher has a list of questions or fairly specific topics to be covered, and the pilot study is helpful for

refining the questions, and including new questions based on comments picked up on or given by interviewees. The pilot study makes the interviewer more familiar with the focus of the interview, and able to appreciate what the interviewees see as significant (Bryman, 2004). The pilot study took place in January 2006 (see the pilot-study and follow-up questions in appendix E and F).

Two respondents were interviewed in order to refine the questions and also to estimate the length of time per interview. This pilot study raised a few important issues which had not been anticipated, and some of the questions were rephrased to obtain more in-depth information.

Further, it was noted during the pilot study that the interviews lasted over two hours, so the questions were reconstructed to be less time consuming, and more focused and specific.

It may also be observed that interviewees’ replies are inconsistent or irrelevant, so the interviewer must bring interviewees back to the topic. Bryman’s (2004) strategy that the interviewer should not talk too much, making the interviewee passive, or too little, making the interviewing feeling he or she is not talking along the right lines, was adopted.

6.3 Sampling

The research sample is carefully selected, not necessarily to be representative of the entire population but rather to represent a key aspect of that domain (Gordon,

1999). For a continuous variable, the choices are not so obvious. However, the researcher is well advised to choose sampling from both extreme values, high and low (Gearring, 2007). Covin and Slevin (1988) on the relationship between entrepreneurial behaviour and organisational structure, evolved and validated a tool which uses six statements of managerial process to evaluate the degree to which respondent firms exhibit an entrepreneurial style. They recommended the approach for classifying groups is to select the overall mean for all scale attributes as the dividing point. Hence, the firms in a sample which have a mean overall score equal to or less than the overall sample mean can be classified as being biased towards operating as non-entrepreneurial firms. Those firms which have a mean score greater than the overall sample mean can be classified as being biased towards operating as entrepreneurial firms. Following methods used for classifying samples in previous research, triangulation techniques were employed in the qualitative data analysis of this research. In relation to the organisational effectiveness section in the questionnaire, the results show a mean score of 74; based on this, firms have been classified into two groups: those attaining organisational effectiveness greater and lower than the mean score, i.e.

the more effective and less effective firms.

Ritchie and Lewis (2003) suggest that, in general, qualitative samples for a single case study involving individual interviews only, may be below 50. If they are larger than that, they start to become difficult to manage in terms of the quality of data collection and analysis that can be achieved. However, it is also essential to make sure that samples are not too small. The sample size in a qualitative study

must support the study’s purpose and generate sufficient data to address the research question posed (Mason, 2002). In addition, the sampling or case should be extreme and deviant; cases are chosen because they are unusual or special and therefore potentially enlightening (Robson, 2002; Patton, 2002). Therefore, the top ten firms of each group were selected; of the twenty managers interviewed, ten respondents were selected from the “more effective” firms and the other ten from the “less effective” firms.

6.4 Data Collection

The data collection took place from January to April 2006 in different provinces in north-eastern Thailand. Since respondents’ firms are located in different provinces, the researcher arranged to drive from site to site in order to cover all the interviews within the time available. Each respondent had limited time for the interview, so the researcher made an appointment one week in advance over the phone. All interview sessions took place in the private office of each respondent within the office hours of 8:00 am to 5:00 pm. Because of the tight schedule of respondents, the interview period lasted from 40 minutes to an hour. Face-to-face conversation and telephone were used to obtain information, beliefs, and opinions from respondents. The interviewer’s main responsibilities were to ask the questions in such a way as to obtain valid responses and to record the responses accurately and completely (Burns, 2000). Accordingly, recording and written interpretation were made during the interview to confirm the accuracy of quotes and descriptions. The researcher realised that the records collected

included personal data and private information, so permission for written notes and tape recordings was obtained prior to the interviews.