Description

The Introduction is titled “The Context of Qualitative Organizational Research.” It explains why qualitative research has become increasingly important in organizational studies and why researchers need to understand not only research techniques, but also the philosophical, ethical and practical issues involved in doing qualitative research.

Main ideas

• Qualitative research has become widely used in organizational research compared with earlier decades.
• It helps researchers understand people’s experiences, meanings, relationships, behaviour and interpretations within organizations.
• Organizational research can be complex because organizations involve people, cultures, relationships, power and changing environments.
• Researchers must carefully consider their research questions, participants, methods and interpretation of data.
• Qualitative research is not simply about collecting interviews or observations; it requires thoughtful decisions about how knowledge is produced and interpreted.
• Researchers need to consider ethics and reflexivity, including how their own position and assumptions may influence the research.