Qualitative Research in Business and Management

Michael D Myers

• Publisher: SAGE Publications Ltd
• Year: 2019
• ISBN:
  9781526418302
• Edition: 3
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: R&D
• Index: Business

This accessible and expansive, yet remarkably concise textbook is designed to help readers with their research project. As well as guiding them through the key methods of collecting and analysing qualitative data, this book provides invaluable information on writing up their research and how to get published.

Now in its third edition, Qualitative Research in Business and Management has been fully updated to include a range of recent examples of aspects of qualitative research in action, and a new look at the methods and ethics of using social media data.

Part I Introduction

Part I provides a general introduction to qualitative research in business and management. Chapter 1 suggests how you can use this book to best advantage. Chapter 2 provides an overview of qualitative research. It discusses the motivation for doing qualitative research, the differences between qualitative and quantitative research and how qualitative research can contribute to the rigour and relevance of research in business and management.

1 How To Use This Book

I decided to write this book for several reasons. First, there are few textbooks that deal specifically with qualitative research in business and management. Often, professors and teachers of qualitative research in business schools use books that are written for a much wider audience, such as the social sciences more generally.

Second, of the few books that are available for students of business and management, most tend to be somewhat narrow in their treatment. They focus on just one or two research methods (such as action research and/or case study research) and often fail to appreciate the potential of different underlying research philosophies (e.g. interpretive research), or of different ways of analysing qualitative data.

Third, I have noticed a tendency for writers of qualitative books in business and management to be somewhat defensive about the use of qualitative research. The tone is one of lamenting the current lack of acceptance of qualitative research in business. Often there are complaints about how difficult it is to get qualitative research articles into the top journals.

The purposes of this book, therefore, are as follows:

• to provide a qualitative textbook that focuses specifically on business and management;
• to provide a broad, reasonably comprehensive discussion of the various qualitative research methods (and their philosophical underpinnings) that researchers can use;
• to provide a qualitative textbook that is enthusiastic and positive about the use of qualitative research in business and management.

With regard to the last point, this book provides examples of qualitative studies drawn from many business and management disciplines. Almost all of the examples have been drawn from the top journals in the disciplines concerned, e.g. Academy of Management Journal in management, MIS Quarterly in the field of information systems or Journal of Consumer Research in marketing. This third edition contains over 60 examples of qualitative research articles from these top journals! This selection of examples from some of the top research journals shows that qualitative researchers in business no longer need to be apologetic or defensive about their research. It seems obvious to me that both qualitative and quantitative research methods are needed to study business phenomena.

In the remainder of this short chapter I will outline the structure of the book and highlight some of its significant features.

Part I provides an introduction to the book and an overview of qualitative research. A key theme is the contribution that qualitative research can make to research in business and management.

Part II provides an overview of some fundamental concepts in qualitative research. It looks at various approaches to research philosophy, research design and research ethics. I believe it is important for research students to be aware of the different underlying assumptions and research designs that can inform qualitative research. All qualitative researchers should make their research designs and underlying philosophical assumptions explicit.

Part III deals with the most common research methods that are used in business and management today. I define a research method as a strategy of enquiry or a way of finding empirical data about the (social) world. Chapter 6 deals with action research, Chapter 7 case study research, Chapter 8 ethnographic research and Chapter 9 grounded theory. A key feature of this part of the book is that it outlines the advantages and disadvantages of the various research methods.

In Part IV, I discuss the use of qualitative techniques for data collection. In business and management, the most important qualitative technique is the use of interviews (Chapter 10). However, participant observation and fieldwork are discussed in Chapter 11 and the use of documents in Chapter 12.

Part V focuses on analysing and interpreting qualitative data. The tremendous variety in approaches is reviewed in Chapter 13, whereas the following three chapters discuss three specific approaches in more detail. These are hermeneutics (Chapter 14), semiotics (Chapter 15) and narrative and metaphor (Chapter 16).

In Part VI, I look at writing up and publishing qualitative research. Chapter 17 focuses solely on the process of writing up (mostly for a thesis or dissertation) whereas Chapter 18 focuses on getting published. As journal articles tend to count much more than books in all the business and management disciplines, I provide some practical guidance with respect to getting qualitative research work published in peer-reviewed conferences and academic journals. This is one of the distinguishing features of the book.

Part VII is the concluding section. Chapter 19 looks at qualitative research in perspective. This is followed by a glossary of some of the most commonly used terms in qualitative research.

2 Overview of Qualitative Research

Learning Outcomes

By the end of this chapter, you will be able to:

• Understand the purpose of qualitative research
• Appreciate the benefits of qualitative research
• Recognize what counts as research and what does not
• Distinguish between quantitative and qualitative research
• Decide whether or not to use triangulation
• See how qualitative research can contribute to the rigour and relevance of research

2.1 Why Do Qualitative Research?

Qualitative research methods are designed to help researchers understand people and what they say and do. They are designed to help researchers understand the social and cultural contexts within which people live.

One of the key benefits of qualitative research is that it allows a researcher to see and understand the context within which decisions and actions take place. It is often the case that human decisions and actions can only be understood in context – it is the context that helps to ‘explain’ why someone acted as they did. And this context (or multiple contexts) is best understood by talking to people.

Qualitative researchers contend that it is virtually impossible to understand why someone did something or why something happened in an organization, without talking to people about it. Imagine if the police tried to solve a serious crime without being able to talk to the suspects or witnesses. If the police were restricted to using only quantitative data, almost no crimes would be solved. Imagine if lawyers and judges were not allowed to question or cross-examine witnesses in court. The validity and reliability of any court decision would be thrown into serious doubt. So, likewise, qualitative researchers argue that if you want to understand people’s motivations, their reasons, their actions, and the context for their beliefs and actions in an in-depth way, qualitative research is best. Kaplan & Maxwell (1994) say that the goal of understanding a phenomenon from the point of view of the participants and its particular social and institutional context is largely lost when textual data are quantified.

One of the primary motivations for doing qualitative, as opposed to quantitative, research comes from the observation that, if there is one thing which distinguishes humans from the natural world, it is their ability to talk. It is only by talking to people, or reading what they have written, that we can find out what they are thinking, and understanding their thoughts goes a long way towards explaining their actions.

Types of Questions Using Qualitative Research

The questions that a qualitative researcher might typically ask are what, why, how and when questions:

• What is happening here?
• Why is it happening?
• How has it come to happen this way?
• When did it happen?

2.2 What Is Research?

In a university setting, research is defined as an original investigation undertaken in order to contribute to knowledge and understanding in a particular field. Research is a creative activity leading to the production of new knowledge. The knowledge produced is new in the sense that the facts, the interpretation of those facts or the theories used to explain them might not have been used in a particular way before in that specific discipline.

Research typically involves enquiry of an empirical or conceptual nature and is conducted by people with specialist knowledge about the subject matter, theories and methods in a specific field. Research may involve contributing to the intellectual infrastructure of a subject or discipline (e.g. by publishing a dictionary). In some fields, such as engin...