Breaking the Silence About Exiting Fieldwork: A Relational Approach and Its Implications For Theorizing

Michailova, Snejina; Piekkari, Rebecca; Plakoyiannaki, Emmanuella; Ritvala, Tiina; Mihailova, Irina; Salmi, Asta

doi:10.5465/amr.2011.0403

Cited by 59 publications

(73 citation statements)

References 85 publications

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“…Michailova et al (2014;144) observe that exiting the field is "an outcome of a constant interplay between unforeseen and planned contingencies in the field and negotiations with research participants", an interplay that is also characteristic of access. As such, access is neither a staged process, nor a set of activities totally under the researcher's control.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Politics of Access in Fieldwork

Cunliffe

Alcadipani

2016

Organizational Research Methods

100

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Gaining access in fieldwork is crucial to the success of research, and may often be problematic because it involves working in complex social situations. This paper examines the intricacies of access, conceptualizing it as a fluid, temporal and political process that requires sensitivity to social issues and to potential ethical choices faced by both researchers and organization members. Our contribution lies in offering ways in which researchers can reflexively negotiate the challenges of access by: 1. Underscoring the complex and relational nature of access by conceptualizing three relational perspectives -instrumental, transactional and relational -proposing the latter as a strategy for developing a diplomatic sensitivity to the politics of access; 2. Explicating the political, ethical and emergent nature of access by framing it as an ongoing process of immersion, backstage dramas, and deception; and 3. Offering a number of relational micropractices to help researchers negotiate the complexities of access. We illustrate the challenges of gaining and maintaining access through examples from the literature and from Rafael's attempts to gain access to carry out fieldwork in a Police Force.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Politics of Access in Fieldwork

Cunliffe

Alcadipani

2016

Organizational Research Methods

100

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“…Such a relational approach can be seen to "break the silence about exiting fieldwork" (Michailova et al, 2014) with reflexivity around the process of exit, separation and distancing with those being researched in the writing of texts.…”

Section: Representation Of and Relations With Those We Researchmentioning

confidence: 99%

Researching the multinational corporation: contributions of critical realist ethnography

Sharpe

2018

CPOIB

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Purpose The purpose of this paper is to discuss the contributions that critical realist ethnographies can make to an understanding of the multinational corporation. Design/methodology/approach This paper draws on a discussion of methodological challenges in researching the multinational corporation and the ways in which critical realist ethnographies can respond to these challenges. The example of research on the transfer of management practices is used to illustrate this. Findings Taking the example of researching the transfer of management practices within the multinational, the paper argues that the potential of critical realist ethnography including critical realist global ethnography to contribute to the field of International Business and International Management remains relatively untapped. Research limitations/implications Adopting the sociological imagination of the critical realist ethnographer has implications for the kinds of questions that are asked by the researcher and the ways in which we seek to address these methodologically. Researching from a critical standpoint fruitful empirical themes for further research relate to the experience of change for example in business systems, internationalization of organizations and “globalization”. Practical implications The critical realist ethnographer can contribute insights into the complex social and political processes within the multinational and provide insights into how social structures are both impacting on and impacted by individuals and groups. Ethnographic research located within a critical realist framework has the potential to address questions of how stability and change take place within specific structural, cultural and power relations. Originality/value At the methodological level, this paper highlights the potential of critical realist ethnography in researching the multinational, in addressing significant questions facing the critical researcher and in gaining a privileged insight into the lived experience of globalization.

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“…We argue that participant 23 deconstruction supports and complements these general approaches by offering a specific technique that ethnographers, participant observers, case researchers, and interviewers can implement within their relationally reflexive practice. Moreover, the technique's focus on the getting-on stage of field research fills a gap between approaches for researcher reflexivity at the getting-in stage of gaining access (Cunliffe & Alcadipani, 2016;Peticca-Harris et al, 2016) and getting-out stage of exit (Michailova et al, 2014).…”

Section: -------------------------------------------------Insert Tablmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…At the 'getting on' stage, researchers enter the field and try to gain understanding of the lives of research participants (Buchanan et al, 1988). At the 'getting out' and 'getting back' stages, researchers exit from fieldwork and return to the field in ways that facilitate theorizing about phenomenon and support scholarly writing (Michailova et al, 2014). While each stage presents challenges for field researchers, the 'getting on' stage is particularly challenging because entering the social world of the field requires building relationships and trust with suspicious or reluctant research participants (Cunliffe & Alcadipani, 2016;Dundon & Ryan, 2010).…”

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confidence: 99%

Getting On With Field Research Using Participant Deconstruction

Wright

Middleton

Hibbert

et al. 2018

Organizational Research Methods

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This article adds to the repertoire of field research methods through developing the technique of “participant deconstruction.” This technique involves research participants challenging and reinterpreting organizational texts through the application of orienting, disorienting, and reorienting deconstructive questions. We show how participant deconstruction complements existing strategies for “getting on” with field research—cultivating relationships, developing outsider knowledge, and mobilizing insider knowledge—by facilitating research participants’ questioning and challenging of organizational texts and thus opening up alternative latent understandings, illuminating concealed meanings, supporting reflexivity for participants and researchers, and suggesting fruitful lines of inquiry. We illustrate the application of the technique with examples drawn from health care research projects. Through gathering further practitioner feedback from a variety of alternative contexts, we go on to demonstrate the potential application of participant deconstruction in a range of field contexts, by different types of practitioners undertaking deconstructive readings of a wide variety of organizational texts. We also offer suggestions for further research to extend the technique.

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Breaking the Silence About Exiting Fieldwork: A Relational Approach and Its Implications For Theorizing

Cited by 59 publications

References 85 publications

The Politics of Access in Fieldwork

The Politics of Access in Fieldwork

Researching the multinational corporation: contributions of critical realist ethnography

Getting On With Field Research Using Participant Deconstruction

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