Qualitative Interview

Conceptual Overview

The use of qualitative interviews in organization studies is far from a uniform practice. Interview research is conducted in an array of modes and can be based upon a variety of epistemological and ontological premises. Standard overviews of different types of interviews often stress the degree of structuring (structured, semi-structured, unstructured), the number of people involved (individual or group), and the media of communication (face-to-face conversation, telephone, e-mail). However, on a more conceptual level, three broad approaches to qualitative interviews in organization can be identified: neopositivism, romanticism, and localism. To some extent, the three approaches—in this order—also represent the historical development of interview-based research in the social sciences in general and in organization studies in particular.

The neopositivist interviewer aims to establish a context-free truth about reality “out there” by means of following a research protocol and getting responses relevant to it. The idea is that the researcher's influence and other sources of bias hereby are minimized. Rooted in a representational conception of the language/reality-relation—that is, the view that language can mirror reality—the interview is here understood as a pipeline through which information regarding events, behavior, and states of affairs can be transmitted. Kelly, Lawlor, and O'Donohoe's 2005 study of the production of advertisements is an example of a neopositivist treatment of interview material. Although the authors adhere explicitly to discourse analytical ideas, the object of study—the production of advertisements in advertising agencies—is in effect explored by means of interviews with eight advertisers (copywriters and art directors). The interview accounts are used as indicators of the everyday creative work at an advertising agency.

An interviewer taking the stance of romanticism advocates what is considered a more genuine human interaction. The romanticist stance toward interviews is based upon a belief in establishing rapport, trust, and commitment between interviewer and respondent in the interview situation, which is regarded as a prerequisite to exploring the inner world (meanings, experiences, ideas, feelings, intentions) of the respondent. The romanticist interviewer is thus, like the neopositivist one, guided by a representational understanding of how language works, but interview accounts are here seen as potential representations of inner states of mind, that is, of cognitive and emotional phenomena. This approach is prevalent in the postpositivist, interpretive tradition of organization studies, where the primary ambition is to explore the meanings and experiences of organizational phenomena. One example of interview research of this ilk is Sandberg's study of competence from 2000. Competence is here studied from a phenomenological perspective and seen as a matter of the ways in which individuals define and relate to their work task. Through a number of interviews and careful interpretations of deeper meanings and the respondents' modes of relating to their work, the researcher suggests a phenomenologically derived understanding of what competence is about.

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