Indicadores de Rendimiento de la Administración Local

This section discusses the methods of data collection used in the case study, inter-views, observations and documents.

4.3.1 Interviews

Interviews were chosen as the main method of data collection. As has been shown in the literature review, interpretivist research looks at the performances by human actors as they engage with an information system. As the conceptualization of agility used in this thesis looks for qualities like “perceived economy” or “perceived simpli-city” (following Conboy 2009), these can be explored by talking to the actors involved and asking about their perceptions. Thus, data was collected through semi-structured, qualitative interviews with employees within Telco. Interviews were typi-cally 45 minutes to 1 hour in length. All interviews were transcribed by the resear-cher with the help of a transcription software (f5transkript) before they were coded using ATLAS.ti. 40 interviews were conducted (see Appendix A for details – refe-renced below in the form ix).

Like all methods of qualitative data collection, interviews involve a degree of sub-jectivism in their interpretation (Holstein & Gubrium 1997). Gaskell (2000) points out the limitations of interviews as a data collection method, which amount to the fact that all information is gained through the eyes of the interviewees, so it may be limited or biased. Even the process of transcribing interview recordings can be seen as an act of construction and sense making (Hammersley 2010). Kvale & Brinkmann (2008, p. 53) sum up the unique features of interviews: “Interview knowledge is produced, relational, conversational, contextual, linguistic, narrative, and pragmatic.”

Thus, the interviewer plays a key role in constructing meaning as well, for example by choosing specific questions, or by writing up the interview findings in a certain way. This fits with the interpretivist epistemology of this study as well as the stratified ontology of critical realism, in which interviews would be seen as empirical data that is subject to people’s interpretations. Thus, their subjective nature is acknowledged in this study.

Interviews can still be a useful way of data collection if researchers reflect on these limitations. By following established standards and guidelines, this thesis aims to avoid these shortfalls and produce results that are of high quality and validity. It has been pointed out, however, that interviews are in no way objective and should not be seen as a method to reveal an inherent truth hidden in a case to be studied. Indeed,

researchers should embrace the active character of the interview, as (Holstein &

Gubrium 1997) point out:

we suggest that researchers take a more active perspective, begin to ac-knowledge, and capitalize upon, interviewers’ and respondents’ constitutive contribution to the production of interview data. This means consciously and conscientiously attending to the interview process and its product in ways that are more sensitive to the social construction of knowledge. (p.

114)

This study acknowledges the produced and contextual character of interviews by adopting an interpretivist epistemology. Rigour is ensured by following the recom-mendations for qualitative interviewing given by Myers & Newman (2007):

 Situating the researcher as actor: Potential interviewees received a document introducing the researcher and outlining the research project. This was also discussed briefly at the start of each interview.

 Minimise social dissonance: Due to the researcher’s experience working in a high-tech environment, he was reasonably able to blend in with the more tech-savvy interviewees. He made sure to repeat some of the jargon they used, and sometimes mentioned experiences from his own work history.

Moreover, the confidentiality of any information shared was stressed in line with the non-disclosure agreement signed with Telco and LSE’s ethical guidelines.

 Represent various “voices”: People from various departments and with diffe-rent levels of seniority were interviewed – from call centre workers to C-level executives.

4.3.2 Other data sources

Beside the interviews, some other types of data were used as well. Ten observation sessions were conducted with various employees in Telco call centres using some of the tools described in the case study (see Table 10 for an overview). These gave valuable insights into the ways Telco employees use their tools and structure their workflows, and gave the researcher the opportunity to observe some of the tools described in the case study, as well as the way people interacted with them. A small number of documents deemed relevant by interviewees were also considered – these

included screenshots of relevant tools as well as some emails. Observations and documents are referenced below in the form ox or dx.

Date, duration Location Observations

11 December 2014, one day Accrington call centre

o1-o2

Warrington call

centre

o3-o5 18 February 2015, half day Canterbury call

centre

o6-o7 04 March 2015, one day Newcastle call centre o8- o10

Table 10 Site visits and observations

Some of the same points of criticism that have been discussed with regards to inter-views can also be made about these methods. Clifford & Marcus (1986) call ethno-graphies “fictions” (p. 6) and point out that in ethnography, a neutral account is not possible as by writing, researchers create reality. Yet the benefit of participant obser-vation is precisely that it allows the researcher to become part of this process of meaning-making: By immersing in the scene to be researched, they can understand the actors’ points of view and see how these are socially constructed. Documents are more concrete than interviews or participant observation in that it is usually clear what has been said, and by whom. Nevertheless, even texts can be ambiguous, as evidenced by the tradition of hermeneutics from biblical texts to modern literature (Myers 2004). Moreover, as with the other data considered here, documents can be seen to construct the reality of their author, so they should not be taken at face value uncritically. This is again ensured by the interpretivist epistemology in this thesis.

4.3.3 Questions to ask

Despite these limitations, these methods should yield a good understanding of the generative mechanisms at work at Telco. Potential questions to ask of the case study, based on the conceptual framework, include:

 What is Telco employees’ idea of organizational agility?

 How to they seek to achieve it?

 What obstacles do they perceive?

 What are the processes of sensing and responding involved?

 What is the role of information systems in these processes? What sort of information systems are used?

Additionally, the research agreement document with Telco contained a number of questions to direct the study:

 “Developments would need to be made in an agile way, potentially super-ceding other planned developments – but how are these prioritised?”

 “What processes are currently in place and how (or why) could they be circumvented to allow for innovation?”

 “What are the opposing forces at play which may affect an individual’s ability or willingness to circumvent a process?”

From these questions, and their scope, it was concluded that the case study should begin with an exploratory phase in order to gain an overview of the case before it could focus on more specific aspects of the case in a second phase. These questions were then translated into a questionnaire, which served as the basis for the inter-views.

The initial questionnaire was based on key concepts from the conceptual framework (see Appendix B). It was adapted during interviews according to the way the inter-view developed. As the case study progressed, interinter-views became less structured, as they increasingly focussed on aspects of the specific projects the interviewee was working on. Having this questionnaire, however, ensured that no important questions were omitted and that procedures like sharing information about privacy and data protection were observed.