Ethel Brundin

Handbook of Qualitative Research Methods in Entrepreneurship

Edward Elgar 2007

Page 291 to 296

Mohammad Javad Sabet

Assistant Prof: Dr.Arabiun

Entrepreneurship Faculty, University of Tehran, Iran

This Chapter

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• From a macro- towards a micro-perspective

• Real-time methodologies

• From micro to macro

• Methodological concerns

The step-by-step application of real-time methodologies

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Initial phase: interviews with the entrepreneurs and the ‘inner

circles’Initial phase: documentary studies

Conversations and successive

observations of the entrepreneurs

Intimate conversations with the entrepreneurs and conversations

with the ‘inner circles’

Involvement of the entrepreneurs and the ‘inner circles’

Self-reports

Withdrawals from the field

Self-reports (Diaries and e-mails)

• Self-reporting is a method that has been used in other disciplines, such as medicine, psychology and psychotherapy, but is very limited within the field of entrepreneurship.

• Self-reports have, however, appeared occasionally within management research.

• These are an apt form of gathering empirical material in real-time research. With diary notes it is possible to come very close to an entrepreneurial process and obtain access to thoughts, feelings and reflections. Furthermore, the time lapse between when events are happening in the process to the moment they are reflected upon can be made very short and hence the rationalization effects are reduced.

• Advantages and Disadvantages

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Self-reports (Diaries and e-mails)

• Self-reporting is a method that has been used in other disciplines, such as medicine, psychology and psychotherapy, but is very limited within the field of entrepreneurship.

• Self-reports have, however, appeared occasionally within management research.

• These are an apt form of gathering empirical material in real-time research. With diary notes it is possible to come very close to an entrepreneurial process and obtain access to thoughts, feelings and reflections. Furthermore, the time lapse between when events are happening in the process to the moment they are reflected upon can be made very short and hence the rationalization effects are reduced.

• Advantages and Disadvantages

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Withdrawal tactics

• At three points I withdrew from the field.

• I felt a distinct ‘data saturation’ from being so tightly involved in the entrepreneurial processes and needed ‘time out’ to absorb the material I had collected and to ‘re-live’ the process.

• During these time-outs I also attended to other, completely different academic duties, to obtain a distance from the research.

• Often this is advantageous in a research process in order to approach the data with ‘new eyes’.

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Wrapping up entrepreneurial processes

• Narrated chronologies

• The main purpose of the narrated chronologies was to create and optimize understanding and to give the reader the means to learn from the story-telling.

• Illustrations of a micro-process phenomenon in real-time are also available.

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From micro to macro

• The interpretation that takes place applying real-time methodologies is a starting point for the theorizing process.

• Generalization.

• Naturally, this study cannot be generalized in the traditional sense of the word.

• However, it is useful for a local theory on the micro-level that can help build theory on the macro-level and hence constitutes a piece of puzzle in order ‘to begin to piece [the puzzle] together’ and relate it to an outcome.

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Methodological concerns

• Collaboration with managers – and other organizational members – is a way to ensure that researchers bring up interesting and relevant research issues.

• It is beneficial to both parties, but there are some perceived disadvantages as well.– It is a delicate task in an ongoing process to ask people to stop and reflect on what is

going on.

– Telling them about the purpose or not.

– Building confidence.

– Confidentiality.

– The researcher influences on the process of research. Being ‘in charge’ of a research project is always a matter of subjectivity.

– To concentrate on a micro-level is not without pitfalls. Consider local effects.

– The setting here is the Swedish context.

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The End

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