Planning Focus Groups

David L. Morgan

• Publisher: SAGE Publications, Inc
• Year: 1997
• Print ISBN: 9780761908173
• eBook ISBN: 9781506339184
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Social Science Research & Methodology
• Index: Social Sciences

Author David L. Morgan covers the wide range of practical tasks required in the course of a research project when using focus groups. Throughout, Planning Focus Groups emphasizes the clarifying purposes of the research project in order to collect data that meet the goals. The author extensively and concisely covers the basic decisions that are necessary to plan a research project using focus groups, such as who should be in the groups, the total number of groups, their size, and much more. This volume also features a detailed discussion of timelines, personnel, and budgets. Among the other topics covered are recruitment, selecting locations, and recording and managing data. Practical material includes checklists, recruitment tools, timelines, and budgets.

VOLUME 2

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1

About This Book

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The essence of planning is making good decisions. Although we could give this decision-making process a more elevated tone by calling it “research design,” the emphasis throughout this volume will be on the practical choices that are necessary for focus group research.

Awareness is the crucial prerequisite to good decision making, so each chapter in this book raises issues that require decisions. For those who are new to focus groups, this material will alert you to the decisions that need to be made. For those with more experience, reencountering these necessary decisions may help you question some of your assumptions.

Once you are aware that a decision has to be made, you need to know what the options are. There are many different ways of doing focus groups, and most of the material in this volume is a summary of these options. Throughout, there is an emphasis on matching different options to different purposes. Knowing what you want to accomplish is the key to deciding among the available options.

Chapters 2 through 4 provide an overview of the issues that affect the planning process. If a journey of a thousand miles begins with but a single step, then it is crucial to take that first step in the right direction. Think of a project using focus groups as such a journey. The time you spend planning and preparing not only ensures that you arrive at your intended destination, but also gets you there with a minimum of wasted time and effort.

After Chapter 2’s summary of guiding principles of planning, Chapters 3 and 4 present extended examples of the timelines, budgets, and personnel associated with focus group projects. Taken together, these initial chapters consider the full set of planning decisions that go into a focus group project, while the later chapters examine the separate decisions that make up the planning process. In practice, however, those separate decisions will work only if they are well integrated. This volume thus begins by considering the planning process as a whole.

Chapters 5 through 8 present the more specific decisions that need to be made in the course of planning a research project using focus groups. Chapter 5 examines choices about the degree of structure that the interview questions and moderator impose on the group discussion. Chapter 6 presents the options associated with selecting the composition of the groups. Chapter 7 reviews the issues involved in deciding on group size. Chapter 8 examines the factors that determine the number of groups that are necessary. Each of these specific decisions needs to be thought through during the planning process. Putting conscious effort into these decisions helps ensure the quality of the overall results from your work.

The last three chapters go over the actual planning issues involved in setting up focus group sessions. Chapter 9 covers the realities of recruitment. The fact that this is the longest chapter in the book signals not only the detailed planning that needs to go into recruitment but also the broader importance of recruitment to the success of the project as a whole. Chapter 10 discusses how to select and set up locations for the sessions. Chapter 11 concludes the volume by reviewing the fundamental decisions that need to made throughout the planning process.

Throughout, each of these chapters will emphasize a basic set of principles:

• The success of the project at every stage depends on planning.
• Effective planning consists of comparing options and making decisions.
• Good decisions require a clear sense of your goals and purposes.

Planning is thus more than a mechanical set of procedures. It is, ultimately, a matter of deciding what you want to accomplish and how you will do it.

VOLUME 2

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2

Guiding Principles of Planning

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Overview

Think Through the Project From Start to Finish

Four Basic Steps

Plan to Meet Your Purposes: “It All Depends on What You Want”

Planning: The Big Picture

The groups themselves are the most obvious part of any focus group project. Yet, in many ways, these groups are just the proverbial “tip of the iceberg.” At a minimum, a successful set of groups depends on careful preparation. Furthermore, a successful project depends on more than just conducting good groups. After all, the real issue is what you do with the data that the groups provide.

We thus do not think of the planning process as something that happens up front. Instead, we emphasize a planning process that carries through from the first decision to use focus groups to the final analysis and reporting.

Think Through the Project From Start to Finish

The key to planning in focus groups is to think through the whole project. Those who are new to focus groups too often think solely in terms of the group discussions themselves. Those with more experience pay just as much attention to the work that occurs before and after the actual groups. What needs to be planned is the complete research project, not just moderating the focus groups themselves.

Fortunately, thinking through the project as a whole is not as difficult as it may sound, even if this is your first time using focus groups. Virtually all research projects using focus groups consist of four basic steps:

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What Needs to Be Planned Is the Complete Research Project

• Planning
• Recruiting
• Moderating
• Analyzing and reporting

Thinking through these steps will help you plan for the project as a whole.

Four Basic Steps

Planning

Successful projects begin with careful planning. The goal in this step is to anticipate the major decisions that need to be made. This volume is dedicated to helping you make smart choices associated with the many planning decisions that are necessary for a successful project. In addition to the general discussion in this volume, three of the most crucial concerns in the planning process each receive extended coverage in this kit.

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See Developing Questions for Focus Groups, Moderating Focus Groups, and Analyzing and Reporting Focus Group Results

Recruiting

Having the right participants in the groups is every bit as important as asking good questions or using a skilled moderator. Although recruitment may be one of the more mundane steps in a focus group project, it is absolutely essential. Problems with recruitment are the single most common reason why things go wrong in focus group projects, so solid recruitment planning is one of the smartest moves you can make.

Moderating

When most people think about focus groups, they think about moderating. Taking part in the participants’ discussions is undoubtedly the most exciting part of the process. After all, these discussions are the data! But effective discussions don’t happen magically. At a minimum, you need to have good questions and successful recruitment. It is this prior planning that makes good moderating possible.

Analysis and Reporting

There is little point in gathering high-quality data if you don’t use them well. Failing to plan for the analysis can result in either of two very different problems. Sometimes, the amount or complexity of the data is overwhelming, and the analysis consists of little more than grabbing a few high points. At the other extreme, sometimes too much effort goes into combing through materials that really don’t matter. By planning what needs to be in the final report, you can avoid the trap of either underanalyzing or overanalyzing the data.

Taking all four of these steps into account, the fundamental message is that moderating is just the tip of the iceberg. In most focus group projects, the time that is spent actually moderating groups is less than the time spent on each of the other three basic steps—often far less. Yes, moderating is a crucial step, but no more so than the other three. If you don’t ask the right questions, or talk to the right people, or know what to do with the data, then it doesn’t matter how good a job the moderator does. A successful focus group project requires ca...

Table of contents

• Cover page
• Title
• Copyright
• Brief Table of Contents
• Detailed Table of Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction to the Focus Group Kit
• 1. About This Book
• 2. Guiding Principles of Planning
• 3. Planning and Timelines
• 4. Personnel and Budgeting
• 5. Deciding on the Degree of Structure
• 6. Deciding on the Group Composition
• 7. Deciding on Group Size
• 8. Deciding on the Number of Groups
• 9. Recruiting the Participants
• 10. Setting Up the Sessions
• 11. Checklist for Planning Focus Groups
• References
• Index to This Volume
• Index to the Focus Group Kit
• About the Author