Discussion:
Self-Reflection: What learned from Interviewing
Conducted a phone interview with an interviewee based in Lebanon who is a Ph.D. candidate at Walden University in Leadership program. The interview was conducted on Saturday 15th October 2016. The interview started at around 19.00 GMT and lasted for about 12 minutes. The main purpose of the interview was to discuss social change and what it means to the interviewee in the context of Walden University. In this discussion post, I reflect on this practical experience of conducting live interview and the lessons learned in the process.
Self-Reflection on my Interviewing Experience
There are two significant ways in which I found the experience of conducting live interview different from a conventional conversation. The first key difference between conducting a qualitative interviewing and a normal conversation is evidenced in the process of choosing participants. I found the process followed in the choice of interviewee to differs significantly from what would normally be the case when engaging in an ordinary conversation. As noted by Rubin and Rubin (2012), ordinary conversations normally take place among friends, relatives, or even strangers, and it mostly happens without much planning. As explained by Burkholder, Cox, and Crawford (2016), the focus of a conversational outcome is often immediate. Unlike the case with the ordinary conversation however, my choice of who to interview was purposeful, with specific aim to gaining information and perspectives on a phenomenon of social change. Rubin and Rubin (2012) further stressed the point that in qualitative interviews, researchers seek more depth on a narrower range of issues that what people do in normal conversations. My choice of the interviewee therefore was deliberate so that the participant is encouraged to contribute to the understanding of the topic at hand.
Another obvious difference between ordinary conversation and qualitative interview concerns the level of planning and organization done with interview questions. Unlike the case with normal conversation, interviewer engages in the planning of interview questions in advance (Babbie, 2016). Such interview questions are usually linked and organized to help in obtaining the information needed for answering the research question. Rubin and Rubin (2012) stressed on this point and explained that for interviewers to obtain depth and details it is critical to structure interview questions around three types of linked questions, involving the main questions, probes, and follow-up questions.
Further, one of the surprising experiences that I faced during the course of the interview was the difficulty of recruiting the interviewee. I could not start the process of recruiting the interviewee until the last few days. This was due to misconception, from my side, that the process would be easy since the target population are colleagues from Walden University. This turned out not to be the case and I had to make several contacts with potential candidate before I was successful. Yet, another learning experience from this exercise relates to a challenge that was caused by the time difference between South Sudan and Lebanon. I was not able to reach the interviewee on my first phone call at the time agreed for the interview. This worried me a great deal but it turned out that there was misunderstanding caused by time difference between our two countries.
Conclusion
This interviewing exercise has provided me with opportunity to practice live qualitative inquiry interviewing. I have attempted to highlight how such interviewing differs from the ordinary conversation. I also discussed some of the surprises, which I experienced during the course of the interview. In general, I found the experience useful, as it has offered practical example of what it look like to conduct interview in the real world. The opportunity has thus enable me to practice skills learned during the course and was able to grasp what the process of interviewing entails and the outcomes a researcher can expect.