Access to cases in public organisations

"getting acquiescence to interviewees is perhaps the easiest task in case study research" {Stake, 2005:65}

Such acquiescence is not easy for researching consultant-client relationships. Both parties are shy - skittish. Getting into central government is even more difficult because of the sensitivity and secrecy - hardly surprising given the criticism central government departments can face, like "x department spent so much on consultants or £m wasted on failed government IT. It's about politics here on the BBC. And selling papers here.

Such criticism may not be deserved - government servants face so much accountability and their top people do not want to be hauled up in front of a select committee to explain a public failure. Neither do their suppliers. Is it only the specialist IT media that report the less political good news here?

Maybe they suspect the motives of researchers looking for bad news, and don't believe they are looking to see how they do what they do together. On top of that, they are busy, just plain working with little spare time to explain what they do to outsiders - wouldn't they have to account for their time anyhow?

As a researcher I'm a guest. Despite the research area being a matter of public interest, I have no scholarly right to know {Stake, 2005}, but am a guest in their spaces. My manners must be good and I have no intention of exploiting or embarrassing anybody.

---

STAKE, R. E. (2005) Qualitative case studies. IN DENZIN, N. K. & LINCOLN, Y. S. (Eds.) The sage handbook of qualitative research. London, Sage Publications.

Getting the message through

Had supervision today. It wasn't great. Supervisor number 1 is into nag-about-access-mode, worrying that I haven't any more case studies yet. I daren't assure her that I have access until it happens, so I don't give her best case scenarios, but let her worry along with me.

Then neither of them were happy with my writing, "muddled" they said it was and too note-like. I've used bullet points - they said at the last meeting to use bullet points - but it's not good enough because I need to join up the bullet points and the quotes with explanations. And layout the setting more clearly and describe the actors more clearly. And write the story more clearly.

The day after I'd sent the paper to them I had an insight to something in the case study that showed how a missing client-consultant engagement at tactical level was overcome through good consultant-consultant engagement and consultant client engagement at strategic level. When I told them that idea, supervisors liked it, though I thought it analytical and they'd told me to write descriptively so I'd not have included it in this paper.

Following up contacts

Following up contacts can be nervous making. I imagine contacts might be rude - unlikely, or expect you to know something you don't know so you feel stupid and embarrassed. I don't like following up but I have to do it. I think it must be like selling and following up leads; I need to know how to sell.

I plan carefully. If it's a phone call, there are four scenarios:

1. They answer and say "Yes, do come and talk to our people and our consultants. Give us your dates and we'll draw up a timetable for to talk to three people the first date and arrange three or four others on another date". Ha! I'd be lucky.
2. They don't answer the phone and I have to try another time. Procrastination is purgatory.
3. They have an answer phone. I plan before dialling exactly what message I'm going to leave like name, where from, why I'm phoning, that I'll phone again, what my number is time and date of call
4. Wrong number - check my records and look for the right number.

I also plan email. I write an introduction, why I'm emailing and I hope for a reply. Sometime it doesn't come for weeks and I don't know if it's because people are considering my request or ignoring me, so I hesitate to email again. Often they've very kindly considered my email, taken it to others in the organisation and discussed it. Some have come back and said:

"Sorry, too busy at the moment"
"Sorry, we've no suitable IT project"
"Sorry, we can't help you."

It's good of them to have gone to the trouble. Perhaps it's even been an AOB agenda item for a project closing meeting. So I'm grateful just for the consideration.

What bothers me is if people are worried that my research might expose them to media vilification. To allay fears I've written a short summary on my aims and methodology. Some have asked for my CV - okay. Others have checked my OUBS web page and followed the link to this blog. So I'm being open and honest about my research.

Perhaps my hesitation to follow contacts is because I don't know very much about the contacts so I can't tell if I'm wasting their time. Though I doubt anyone is going to come to me voluntarily saying "Here's our organisation. We used consultants on an IT project that's nearly finished. Do come in! We'll all talk to you."

No, my job is to sell my research - be a saleswoman.

Practicalities

Getting access to organisations who will let me talk with its people, and the consultants it uses is is a practical difficulty. Today I'm attending a seminar:

"Doing Qualitative Research: practical approaches".

I hope it gives me some ideas of how to get another case study.

Access

My research won't cost the organisation money, just an hour of the time of the people who've worked on a project the organisation has chosen to let me near. Some organisations tell me they're just about to start a new project - so doesn't that mean they've just finished one, and can't I come and listen to people talk about it? I won't take photos if they don't want me to. I'll not tell who they are and I don't need to know the data on the project. And they'll be contributing to knowledge of how to make projects work better. Aren't people proud of what they do?

Access

I've been offered access. Hurrah!

Insecurity

This is such an insecure activity – looking for access.

The ethics committee told me to create an information sheet, which I’ve done, and my supervisors weren’t interested immediately but now have commented that they wouldn’t have written it like this, so I’ve got amendments to make. and my supervisors say that they’d write the email differently and so on.

I'm finding complying with the OU ethics committee on one hand and the need to get access on the other sometimes incompatible. On the one hand, I find example information sheets that cover everything, but on the other hand, such sheets might

1. scare off potential participants
2. be too simplistic for the intelligent business people that I hope to speak to.

For example, my supervisor found the wording that

"researchers are not allowed to persuade people to participate"

'rather bizarre'. And I agree. Why shouldn't I try to get people to participate? In the long run, the research should benefit more than just me.

Still no access

It's fourteen days since I sent my first request hoping for access. It's only fourteen days. And I've got another year and 49 weeks to finish my PhD. But I haven't yet spoken to anyone, had a conversation with anyone, or a phone call with anyone. But then again, I've contacted four people this week, and it's early days yet.

So I yo-yo between worrying and being sanguine. I know students who took all year to get their access for qualitative data, and one is still struggling. Studies on sensitive topics, like ethics of marketing, ("I heard you got told off for your advert so can I come and interview you?") and how someone fits into an organisation ("You're a bit odd - can we talk?") don't get access easily.

I don't have ethics committee issues, I'm not going to say nasty things about the organisation and I don't think my research topic is very sensitive. I just want to know how they do it, work with consultants.

Getting in

How do you persuade people to give you access?

They're busy, they don't understand research, they're suspicious that you'll publish something sensitive, they don't have the time to waste, or they've gone off on maternity leave or holiday.

I drafted a letter and showed it to a colleague, who pointed out that I had no pleases or thank yous. :( But he pointed me at Buchanan et al {Buchanan, 1988}, an article we read on B852.

I need some heuristics to get in:

• avoid academic terms
• tell them I want conversations
• use words like 'conversation', ' writing an account', 'learn from your experience'
  
• offer to present the request to interested managers

I've redrafted. It might work.

---

Buchanan, D., Boddy, D., McCalman, J., (1988) 'Getting in, getting on, getting out, and getting back '. In Bryman, A. (Ed.) doing research in organisations Routledge, London. 39

Asking for access

I've written two drafts of an email asking for access. I'm happy with the second draft. I just don't yet quite dare to press the send button.

PhD Issues

The OUBS PG students have just had a meeting between themselves. We started with an introductory activity - say what issue you are dealing with now, and your neighbour will offer some advice.

Issues included:

• literature - being stuck on something interesting
• procrastination
• time management
• the more you read the more you're scared by what you don't know!
• waiting for a confidentiality agreement for access to clients
• access to get data
• too small a return rate on samples
• writing to persuade access

Advice included:

• work 8 hours a day
• write anything
• schedule to read x articles per day
• use mnemonic SOSTS to guide your writing

SOSTS =

• Situation
• Objective
• Strategy
• Tactics
• Solution

I think the first two give the background and the later ones are what you want to get to. I'm working on those to write one paragraph that will persuade someone a) that I can write in non-academic terms, b) that I understood what was going on in the meeting, c) that the OU is a competent organisation, including having real research ability d) to introduce me to others of interest in my area e) to provide the access he offered f) to provide any other relevant support.

Writing a proposal

There's the opportunity to present my research to fellow associate lecturers (ALs) in my region. But first I have to write a proposal for the presentation. This has to be an anonymous 200-word abstract giving the title and outline the content of the presentation. So I've taken the abstract from my Masters and tried to rewrite it for the AL audience. Then I emailed it to Dimitra, who has offered writing help. She was absolutely excellent, both in the comments that she emailed back and in the hour and a half she spent discussing my writing with me, pointing out the ambiguities, the points I hadn't made or needed to make clearer, as well as the order in which I made them. The discussion brought to the fore that my original abstract didn't mention the important finding about the difficulties of access, the need for constant negotiation for access, and how that both suggested a reason for lack of empirical evidence of public accountability and implied difficulties for future research.