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Research methodology and data
and purpose of the interviews was explained. The anonymity and
confidentiality of the research was also explained, and the interviewees
were encouraged to openly share their experiences and views regarding the
change program in question. Each interview included a discussion on the
program’s current situation as well as the previous activities. The early days
of the program were discussed retrospectively, starting from its origin and
proceeding towards the current activities. The interviewees were asked to
describe the early program phases, including the motive to implement the
program, the structure of the program, central program-related activities,
the challenges encountered, and perceptions on the progress of the
program. Similarly as reported by Ericksen and Dyer (2004), neutral
interrogation style follow-up questions, “What happened after that? Why
did you do that?” were asked to clarify unclear points and to dig more
deeply into potentially important issues.
During each case study the interviews became somewhat more structured
as they key people, events, and issues specific to the case were identified.
Also, in line with the abductive multiple case study approach, the interview
questions became more focused as the study proceeded and the research
framework was elaborated based on the empirical observations and the
existing theories. Thus, during the first round of interviews conducted in
case Center, the questions addressed program initiation more broadly,
while the interaction between a change program and its parent organization
was highlighted more during the later interview rounds. Some additional
variation in the interview questions across the interview rounds was caused
due to the differing stage of the programs.
The first rounds of interviews in each case included data collection about
the origin and history of the case programs. The second rounds of
interviews in cases Center and Chain discussed the current state and the
elapsed time from the first round interviews, focusing on central events and
activities that had taken place since the first round of data gathering.
Although the interview outlines used in the second rounds of interviews
were more focused, there was still room for the interviewees to express
their views of topics that were not covered by the predefined questions.
Similarly as Meyer (2001) noted, the second rounds of interviews provided
interesting observations of unanticipated effects and changed attitudes.
The interview outlines from each round of interviews can be found in
Appendix 1. In addition to the interview questions presented in the
Appendix, the interviews in the first and the third case (Center and Chain)
included a larger variety of topics, as they served as a data source for other
ongoing studies, focusing on roles in program management, program
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