La pérdida de protagonismo de los movimientos migratorios en el último cuarto del siglo

The main objectives of the interviews were to:

Identify the main organisational improvement initiatives that should be used according to the areas of implementation and organisational excellence maturity. The areas of implementation are based on the common enabler criteria of major BEMs;

Investigate the processes or steps involved in selecting improvement initiatives; Investigate the critical factors that should be considered in selecting

improvement initiatives;

Identify the guidance models currently available to assist in the selection of improvement initiatives;

Evaluate several existing guidance models for selecting improvement initiatives; and

Evaluate the proposed conceptual model for selecting improvement initiatives.

An interview protocol was prepared prior to the interviews to ensure reliability and consistency of the data collection process. At the beginning, the interview protocol was reviewed by the research supervisors and revised accordingly. Then, two pilot

As shown in Figure 3.1, the interviews were conducted in several stages. The protocol for the first stage interviews was developed based on key themes and issues for exploration derived from a literature review, documents review and/or pilot interviews (Strauss & Corbin, 1998). A sample of the protocol for first stage interviews can be referred in Appendix 4. Findings from the first stage interviews together with literature and document review were then analysed and used for the development of the protocol for the second stage interviews (refer to Appendix 5).

Semi-structured interviews were conducted with individual participants in New Zealand, Malaysia and Singapore. Purposive sampling was used for interviews involving:

Chief Executive Officers, Directors, General Managers, Senior Managers, Managers or Executives in the area of quality / BE, selected from organisations that have won a national Quality or BE Award. The winners of Quality or BE award are those organisations that have shown outstanding organisational practices, strategies and performance results based on assessments using proven BEMs (Adebanjo & Mann, 2008b), such as Baldrige CPE (in New Zealand), Singapore Quality Award framework (in Singapore) and Prime Minister’s Quality Award Criteria (in Malaysia). The common assessment criteria for BE award in New Zealand, Singapore and Malaysia are similar involving leadership and social responsibilities, strategy and policy, customers, processes, workforce and, partnership and resources. Chief Executive Officers, Managers or Executives from national custodians of Quality / BE award. The national custodian of BE award in New Zealand is the NZBEF; in Malaysia is the Malaysia Productivity Corporation and Ministry of International Trade and Industry; and in Singapore is the Standards Productivity and Innovation Board Singapore (SPRING).

Consultants specialising in quality management and BE.

According to Tashakkori and Teddlie (1998, p. 76), purposive sampling can be described as a “selection of individuals / groups based on specific questions / purposes of the research in lieu of random sampling and on the basis of information available about these individuals / groups”. The reason for choosing this sample was due to their knowledge and / or experience in the selection and/or implementation of organisational improvement initiatives. This sample allowed the collection of information from both groups of people that disseminate and apply the improvement

initiatives. Consultants and national custodians of Quality / BE award can be considered as the groups that disseminate and promote the implementation of improvement initiatives. Meanwhile, the practitioners selected from organisations that have won a national Quality or BE Award represented the people who actually implement the improvement initiatives.

The interviewees were identified from public documentation of the national custodians of quality / BE award (e.g. previous application reports for quality / BE award, newsletters, websites, or training materials); suggestions from experts in the research field; and/or based on exploratory survey respondents who interested and eligible to participate in the interviews.

The interviewees were contacted in advance via telephone or email and received an information sheet as well as a consent form for recruitment. The information sheet included an invitation to participate in the study as well as the request to provide some relevant documents during the interview. Further explanation about these documents can be found in Section 3.4.4 of Chapter 3.

Interviews were conducted at a mutually arranged venue and time, with the questions being sent to the interviewees beforehand. The interviews lasted approximately one to two hours, and were audio recorded with permission from the participants. Part of the first stage interviews involved asking the interviewees to evaluate the conceptual model as well as obtaining their comments and suggestions for improvement. Before evaluating the model, the interviewees were assisted by the interviewer to understand the model. The same processes were used in second stage interviews except the interviewees were asked to evaluate the refined conceptual model (instead of conceptual model).

The interviews were transcribed into written form. Each transcript was sent to the interviewees for review and possible amendment. Data from interviews were administered, coded and analysed using the QSR NVivo Version 8.0 and 9.0 softwares. The NVivo is one of the qualitative data analysis software that provides a

relating to, or being an example of, a more general idea, instance, theme or category”.

The data was coded into themes, categories or ‘nodes’ and the ‘nodes’ was organised in folders (QSR International, 2010)(see Figure 5.1). The ‘nodes’ in NVivo software refers to “specific locations in the database which reference parts of documents…the node label becomes the code label” (Lewins & Silver, 2007, p. 133). Analytic techniques used in data analysis include: (1) asking questions to identify variation and connection among data, (2) making comparisons, and (3) drawing upon personal experience (Strauss & Corbin, 1998).