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Weekly Updates(2) To establish the study's transferability: How applicable might these findings be to other groups or settings?
(3) To establish the study's dependability: If we were to replicate this study with the same participants would we obtain the same outcome?
(4) To establish the study's confirmability: How do we know the findings represent the viewpoints of the respondents and, to the degree possible, are not representative of the researchers' viewpoints, frames of reference, or prejudices? (This question helps researchers to acknowledge their own inherent biases.) (21)
These questions replace the traditional validity, reliability, and generalizability checks that guide most forms of quantitative research. Given its interpretative nature, an important goal of qualitative research is to demonstrate the trustworthiness of the findings. Unlike quantitative studies, where researchers claim to hold the objective perspective of the "disinterested scientist," qualitative researchers work from a tradition which recognizes that all research findings are interpretative and that the researchers are engaged participants, performing "multi-voice reconstruction." (22) Thus, to build credibility, researchers address the four questions above and, in doing so, make their data-collection methods and analyses detailed and explicit.
Getting the Most from a Qualitative-research Study
Properly executed qualitative research can offer valuable findings for hospitality managers. As was recently stated in an academic journal, "a qualitative study that systematically compares similarities and differences in patterns of interactions, the resulting meanings of key variables, and their influences on various organizational outcomes. . . might reveal important setting factors and dynamics that influence and are influenced by employees' perceptions."23 In other words, qualitative research, by design, can capture insights from the field and specifically examine their implications for ways that organizations strategize, exploring both the creation and consequences of management initiatives. Yet to obtain the most insightful findings, researchers need managers help. This form of research represents a way for researchers and practitioners to collaborate to create new knowledge that is fueled by an organization's needs and realities--and provides meaningful, useful results. In this final section, I explor e the challenges in working with academics to obtain the highest return for managers' time and commitment to a qualitative-research project.
The Complexity of a Simple Concept
In the organizational behavior literature, a great deal is written about the value to managers of working with researchers. Yet most of those writings are prescriptive and contain mostly opinions. For example, a recent call for empirically based papers on knowledge transfer between academics and practitioners resulted in 41 responses, but 16 of those papers contained the authors' positions with no supporting data. (24) (Those articles were returned without being reviewed.) The editors termed this phenomenon "claims in search of evidence." Then, only 25 submissions remained in contention--a small number for such an important topic in an applied field. This statistic suggests how difficult it is for academics and practitioners to collaborate well on research. Some cite academics' and practitioners' different frames of reference, which are shaped by their differing value systems, as the culprit. (25) Others suggest that the two groups have different goals. According to that argument, academics seek new understan dings, while practitioners seek useful information that they can use to shape their decisions. (26)
There is no reason that those two goals must be mutually exclusive. The challenge of qualitative research is to create a working collaboration that contributes to both groups' disparate frames and goals. In an article titled "Doing Research that Is Useful to Practice: A Model and Empirical Exploration," the authors suggest: "the usefulness of research depends in part on the extent to which the perspectives of organization members are included in the research process and the results are incorporated into those members' organization-design activities. ... There [need to be] opportunities for researchers and members to take each others' perspectives and to jointly participate in interpreting the results of the research." (27) Qualitative research seeks to do that through uncovering respondents' in-the-field tacit insights, formally explaining them, and, in the process of creating new knowledge, offering practical insights that can be embedded into new routines for the organization. (28) This practitioner-to-acad emic-back-to-practitioner model can work to meet both groups' needs and simultaneously serve the hospitality field.
Getting Involved in Qualitative-research Studies
Knowledge creation and transfer is a social, dialectic process, in which differing perspectives emerge and new ones are jointly created through dialogue between and within groups. (29) Managers are urged to become involved in the research process. To contribute to and benefit from research findings, managers are encouraged to go beyond merely letting a researcher collect data and generate a report, and instead to discuss the tensions faced between the academic's desire for theoretical insights and the manager's need for solutions to problems. Moreover, managers are encouraged to be active in how the data are collected and analyzed, as well as how results are interpreted and applied, recognizing that reflection with academics is crucial to creating a collaborative learning process. (30)
This advice is echoed by the findings of a joint academic-practitioner team, headed by a well-respected Harvard researcher. This group formed a three-year collaboration to examine the factors which influence creativity in long-term corporate projects. After reflecting on their experiences, the team offered the following advice to both researchers and managers:
(1) To the extent possible, create, a collaborative research team or relationship where each member brings a diverse, yet complementary skill set and background, and at the same time a similar passion of interest and a willingness to work with people who hold different perspectives.
(2) Make sure commitments, roles, and responsibilities are clarified at the outset of the project. Revisit and revise these understandings as necessary.
(3) Establish regular forms of facilitated communication. Push early for preliminary results on which to reflect and discuss.
(4) To build trust and mutual understanding, find ways to get to know team members as people, outside of work.
(5) As a team, regularly reflect on the effectiveness of the collaboration. Build in occasions for team members to share their experiences and perceptions. (31)
No doubt, those suggestions make working with researchers appear to be a daunting endeavor, but it can also be exciting. The simple process of articulating a problem or challenge to an outsider--who can listen but does not need to respond--often leads to a more nuanced understanding for the person facing the problem. By actually raking on an active role-in which the researcher and manager weave together different, but equally important inputs and jointly discover new insights--the manager not only improves organizational performance, but, on a personal level, often learns that the most powerful learning and creative leaps occur in collaboration. Qualitative research has the potential to provide managers with the richest return for the problem at hand, but, more important, for enhancing their decision-making and intuitive skills. Most of all, it represents one way for managers to participate in creating something new that extends beyond the organization and guides the industry to new levels of understanding an d performance.
A Key Merger of Talents
In this article, I explored the process of qualitative research, its role in creating new knowledge for the hospitality industry, and ways that managers may wish to contribute to research projects to help ensure its rigor and usefulness. Managers and researchers are encouraged to contribute jointly to projects and, together, to interpret and apply results. If conducted appropriately, qualitative research represents an exciting venue for creating new, useful knowledge in a manner that serves both researchers and practitioners' divergent needs. It represents a key way for practitioners and academics to merge their talents, expertise, and passion in support of advancing the science of the hospitality industry.
(1.) For a detailed explanation of a qualitative-research technique, see: Robert J. Kwortnik, Jr., "Clarifying 'Fuzzy' Hospitality-management Problems with Depth Interviews and Qualitative Analysis, on pages 117-129 of this Cornell Quarterly.
(2.) M.S. Davis, "That's Interesting! Toward a Phenomenology of Sociology and a Sociology of Phenomenology," Philosophy of the Social Sciences, Vol. 1 (1971), PP. 309-344.
(3.) S.R. Barley, G.W. Meyer, and D.C. Gash, "Culture of Cultures: Academics, Practitioners, and the Pragmatics of Normative Control," Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 33, No. 1 (1988), pp. 24-60.
(4.) S.B. Bacharach, "Organizational Theories: Some Criteria for Evaluation," Academy of Management Review, Vol. 14, No. 4 (1989), pp. 496-515.
(5.) D.A. Whetten, "What Constitutes a Theoretical Contribution?," Academy of Management Review, Vol. 14, No. 4 (1989), pp. 490-495.
(6.) N.K. Denzin and Y.S. Lincoln, "Entering the Field of Qualitative Research," in Handbook of Qualitative Research, ed. N.K. Denzin and YS. Lincoln (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 1994), p. 2.
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