Qualitative research in information systems: consideration of selected theories - Information Systems Foundations: Constructing and Criticising - page 40

that indicate the more beneficial aspects relating to career advancement for information
systems professionals. Suggestions have been made for the information systems profes-
sional, the organisations that employ these individuals, and societies to which information
systems professionals may belong.
Based upon the transcripts of the interviews, common themes were identified. These
themes represented two common trends for the profession. First, the information systems
professionals interviewed tended to associate more closely with the profession than with
a specific organisation. Second, there was an increased desire to remain current with
technology and to have experience with the leading edge technologies. Hunter and Tan
(2001) were able to provide recommendations and suggest implications for various
stakeholders, including information systems professionals, and organisations.
Conclusions
This paper has outlined a qualitative perspective to conducting research in information
systems employing grounded theory, personal construct theory, and narrative inquiry.
Some published research examples have been presented to support the description of
the theories and to demonstrate their application to the information systems field.
A concern about conducting qualitative research relates to verification. In general,
qualitative researchers tend to agree that replication is the best means to validate con-
clusions determined from qualitative research. Further concerns about verification relate
to researcher bias, and reliability.
Qualitative researchers become closely involved in research situations and with research
participants. There arises then a concern about researcher bias. Thus, in an interview,
questions may be posed in a certain way, or certain aspects of the discussion may be
pursued more or less intensively. Some researchers would consider this flexibility to be
beneficial, allowing the researcher to obtain relevant data. However, as Reason and
Rowan (1981) suggest, '… it is much better to be deeply interesting than accurately
boring'. In the end, emphasis should be placed on the research method in order to
counteract the potential introduction of bias.
When conducting qualitative research, it is incumbent upon the investigator to gather
data in a systematic way in order to address the above concerns. The RepGrid technique
has been shown (Stewart and Stewart, 1981) to be an acceptable method to document
the personal constructs of research participants. Its use in the information systems field
will support a response to the call for applied theories (Lee, 1999) and practical relevance
(Benbasat and Zmud, 1999; Robey and Markus, 1998). The Long Interview technique
(McCracken, 1988) supports an open unbiased investigation. It allows the researcher to
document a research participant's interpretation of an event.
Finally, these techniques respond to the concern for qualitative researcher bias by allow-
ing the research participants to determine the response and to provide their own comment
elaboration. The techniques lend structure to the qualitative data gathering process
while allowing flexibility in the research participants' responses. Incorporating these
techniques will support the grounding of interview data within the environment as in-
terpreted by the research participant.