Boundary activities and readiness for ... - Projekti-Instituutti

Research methodology and data
activity and overcoming the articulated challenge, a connection was
concluded. If a clear link between the boundary activity and readiness for
change program implementation could not be found, the corresponding
data field in Figure 6 was left empty.
In the final judgment concerning the associations between specific
boundary activity types and specific indicators of readiness for change,
similar patterns were sought in the spreadsheet. If the interviewees
repeatedly associated a boundary activity of a certain type and a certain
aspect of readiness for change program implementation, and if this
connection was observed in more than one interview, then an association
was assumed. This resulted in a matrix table that reported whether each
boundary activity type was associated with each indicator of readiness for
change program implementation. Potential explanations for the identified
connections were also simultaneously recorded.
Furthermore, the third phase of the analysis included an examination of
the contextual factors that might explain the observations and cross-case
differences concerning the frequency of boundary activities, the level of
readiness for change, and the identified (or missing) associations between
the boundary activities and the indicators of readiness. Potentially relevant
contextual factors had been identified and recorded during the coding
process. The numerous memos created during the coding process as well as
the observations recorded in the spreadsheet (column “K” in Figure 6)
provided additional information on the characteristics, conditions, enablers
and limitations related to each case. Common patterns were sought from all
this data and the three cases were contrasted to detect the most central
contextual differences. Existing literature was also utilized to inform this
search. This resulted in a list of main contextual factors that were suggested
to have a central role in explaining the differences in the findings across the
three cases.
During the third phase of the analysis, the results of the empirical study
were recorded. Following the suggestions by Miles and Huberman (1994)
and Eisenhardt and Graebner (2007), illustrative forms of data display
were utilized to summarize the case evidence, including tables, crosstabulations,
figures, and charts. In reporting the results, direct quotes from
the interviews are also used extensively to illustrate the findings and
provide more depth for the observations. As the interviews were conducted
in Finnish, all quotes appearing in this thesis have been translated into
English.
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