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103 Interviews and Surveys in Scientific Works
Statistical representivity is the core of sampling. Qualitative research, in contrast, relies on find-
ing the importance of the surveyed topics for the subjects, therefore their contextual relevance
(Mayer, H. O., 2008, p. 39).
The personal (and telephone) interview is independent of whether it is free, structured or stan-
dardized, or controlled with an interview guide. This is classified into primary, secondary and
inquiry. In order to demonstrate, an excerpt is taken from the Interview Guide in Fig. 3 related to
»Needs Determination of the Employee at the Workplace«, which was developed by the author.
This has proven itself in practice, in the case of the subject's agreement to prepare and send the
primary questions for the interview (in individual cases, the entire interview guide).
Order of the questions in the interview guide:
– An open question at the beginning. This should be easy for the subject, and make it pos-
sible for him to orient himself to a role.
– Over the course of the interview, one progresses from the general to topically limited
questions.
Figure 4 | Example of an interview guide "Needs of the Employee in the Workplace"
– Questions which contain affective material, are somewhat problematic, are perhaps un-
comfortable to the subject belong to the middle or second half of the topic area; in no case
should they be the first questions.