essential-guide-to-qualitative-in-organizational-research

––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––– REPERTORY GRIDS –––––––––– 65Table 6.1An example of a completed repertory gridIn control √ X Out of controlAccessible X √ Untrustworthy/ImpersonalMild in views X √ Dominant and forcefulSelf-confident √ X Lacking in confidenceConcerned with people X √ No concern with the impact of theiraround themactionsAmbitious in career √ X Not ambitiousImpulsive, ill-considered √ X Objective and calmHigh academic achievement X √ Solid, down to earthConsistent achiever √ X Inconsistent achieverImmense ambition √ X Comfortable with themselvesX The extent to which this behaviour is important for me to do a good job√ The extent to which this behaviour is important to be successful in the companyon each of the constructs. We deviated from this traditional procedure in this research becausewe were keen to identify any potential discrepancies between men’s and women’s views ofeffective performance as outlined above. As you can see from Table 6.1, the interviewee feelsthat in order to do a good job he needs to be ‘concerned with the people around him’, butthis is not a behaviour that is necessarily rewarded by the company. The opposite can be saidfor ‘confidence’ and ‘ambition’, two constructs that are seen to be important for success inthe company, but that the interviewee perceives as not that necessary to do a good job.A total of 562 constructs were generated from the 60 grids. Each repertory grid in itselfis a rich source of data, consequently the first stage of analysis involved the researchers in theprocess of ‘immersion’ (King, 1994) where we read and studied the grids numerous times inorder to familiarize ourselves with the data and look for meaningful patterns, for examplewithin organizations. At the second stage in order to analyse the grid data we began bygenerating categories in line with the processes of grounded theory (Glaser and Strauss, 1967;Henwood and Pidgeon, 1992; Länsisalmi et al., Chapter 20, this volume). We referred to thesecategories as themes. In this approach the themes do not emerge from some pre-existingtheoretical concerns, but rather from the data themselves. This is consistent with Kelly’s PCPand the general philosophy underlying repertory grid technique. Each construct was examinedin turn to generate the initial set of themes, within which each construct could be placed. Thethemes were then altered or regrouped as a result of the process of splitting or splicing themeswhere appropriate. The next stage of the analysis involved the researchers discussing theconstruct theme allocations together, to see whether any alternative interpretations could haveoccurred. One of the aims of this discussion was to assess the extent to which the data weretrustworthy or credible, that is did the allocation of a construct to a particular theme makesense? In discussing these allocations, making sense of the meaning of constructs was enhancedby having access to the comments made by interviewees as part of the interview process.