The interview is very knowledge liked in-depth analysis. In-Depth Interview as a Research Method

The survey method "deep interviews" is an unstructured type of personal interview, in which a highly qualified specialist, in a long confidential conversation, one-on-one interviews the respondent. During an in-depth interview, topics can be very different, the interviewer seeks to find out all the emotions, beliefs and point of view of the respondent regarding the problem that is the focus of attention. As a rule, a group survey does not allow this. The difference between this form of interview is in a personal conversation, to provide an opportunity to freely discuss various issues, without extraneous witnesses who may influence the respondent or cause him stiffness.

The main purposes for which such an interview is used:

1- Studying the attitude of the consumer towards specific companies, brands, products; 2- Concept evaluation new service or a product during its development before a large-scale entry into the market; 3- Preliminary testing of marketing techniques, checking the reaction to them from the consumer.

Features of the in-depth interview

When an in-depth interview is performed, the questions are not as rigidly defined as in a questionnaire. Although the general scheme of the interview is planned in advance, the interviewer, during the conversation, independently, based on the current answers of the respondent, determines which next question go or ask additional, clarifying questions. Depending on the situation and how the conversation develops, such an interview can take a long time, ranging from 30 minutes to several hours. Existing types of in-depth interviews make it possible to establish a trusting relationship with the respondent and obtain unique “deep” information that the respondent can only communicate by completely getting rid of stiffness and embarrassment. This is the only way to find out the primary reasons for the behavior and preferences of certain categories of buyers and customers.

The main three types of in-depth interviews are:

1- Ladder method, consisting in the sequential formulation of questions about the product and its characteristics and the transition to related motives and characteristics of the respondent; 2- Symbolic analysis, comparison of the subjects of the survey with opposites, attempts to determine the symbolic meaning and signs uncharacteristic of the subject; 3- Clarification of hidden problems - identification of personal experiences and problems, unmet needs that cause psychological discomfort for the respondent. 4- Access to detailed and hidden information encourages the use of an in-depth interview whose value is in psychology (for example, the projective method). However, for marketing purposes, this form of survey is in demand and effective in its group of consumer research tasks.

Individual in-depth interview reveals everything hidden

In addition to pre-planning the survey and setting the goal, it is important to prepare the interviewer, who will have to overcome the respondent's isolation and wariness and take him beyond the limits of monosyllabic, Buy from the producer of short answers. From the researcher, this work requires an understanding of all the nuances of the problem.

An in-depth interview is an effective method of obtaining information in such cases:

1- Discussion of confidential issues and topics affecting the personal life of the person being interviewed; 2- Existence of cruel social norms establishing obligatory certain views and norms of behavior for everyone; 3- It is necessary to analyze a unique isolated case, disassemble social role respondent, study his biography in detail; 4- The respondent is an expert in some field; 5- It is required to study in detail difficult situations in which a person made important decisions; 6- A representative of competitors is interrogated, who will not answer questions in front of witnesses; 7- Respondents included in the target sample are small or hard to reach. Conducting in-depth interviews and data processing should be entrusted to a highly qualified interviewer, this guarantees the quality of the result. The personality, communication skills and professionalism of the interviewer is critical to the effectiveness of the interview. In addition, the results of the interview should be processed by experienced psychologists. But these difficulties are justified by the result of such a thorough interview in the form of a complete, accurate and detailed information about the opinion, behavior of a person and their causes, about deep motives and motivations that cannot be known in any other way.

Deep Interview – a method of collecting information through a conversation with the respondent on a pre-prepared list of questions. This conversation is very similar to a traditional journalistic interview - a lengthy conversation on some topic in order to reveal the attitude of the interviewee, his personal opinion on some issue. Often such an interview is conducted with representatives of those segments of the population that are difficult to collect for a collective interview (in our case – with media owners and founders, editors-in-chief, publishers or journalists who have reached certain heights of skill).

In-depth interview questions are also developed based on system analysis object of study. However, they are not as rigid as in the face-to-face survey. The researcher, rather, fixes for himself the main directions of the conversation that need to be touched upon, and a number of questions that need to be answered. Here the interviewee acts as an active participant in the study, he can influence the course of the conversation, direct the conversation in a certain direction. Therefore, good preparation of the interviewer is important, who must be able to creatively respond to the development of the conversation: correct some questions, formulate new topics as the development progresses, keep the interviewee within the framework of the problem, prevent him from being distracted from the main subject of the conversation, and so on.

It should be borne in mind that although the research method of in-depth interviews does not a large number of people - sometimes only three or four of them - have their own difficulties in using this method. Firstly, the respondents are people who have achieved a certain position in society, and they, as a rule, are often busy and it is not always possible to obtain their consent for an interview. Secondly, conducting in-depth interviews is much more difficult than interviewing people using a formalized questionnaire. In addition, people who are related to journalism and often have their own understanding of how interviews should be conducted act as interlocutors. Meanwhile, a sociological interview, with all its outward similarities, differs from a journalistic one. It is regulated by the goals and objectives, the research program, which means that it involves the collection of certain information on specific issues. In this regard, the "professional vision" of the respondent may act as an obstacle to the conversation. Thirdly, the results of in-depth interviews are much more difficult to process. In fact, all questions in an in-depth interview are open-ended, so they need to be further grouped, and then processed. When analyzing the results of in-depth interviews, they reflect the opinions and positions of respondents on a particular issue.

Approved by the Ministry of Education and Science of Russia as study guide for students of higher educational institutions studying in the areas of preparation of bachelors and masters "Sociology", "Political Science" and in the specialties of training graduates "Sociology", "Psychology", "Political Science" and "Marketing".

Third edition, revised

Moscow 2018

BBK 60.5, 66.0, 65.290

Belanovsky Sergey Alexandrovich

In-Depth Interviews and Focus Groups: tutorial.

ISBN 5-901488-03-2

The real book is teaching aid on conducting in-depth interviews and focus groups in sociological research. Both methods are widely used in electoral and marketing projects, studies of organizations, advertising, the shadow economy, crime and deviant behavior, the study of family problems, and many others. The publication of the book aims to expand methodological base used in social research by Russian and Russian-speaking researchers. Compared to the 2001 edition, the book has been significantly revised.

For sociologists, psychologists, economists, journalists, teachers and students.

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Each of us has heard the word “interview” from time to time and, in fact, it does not represent any secret, because almost everyone knows that an interview is a kind of conversation between two or more people, during which the interviewer (the person conducting the interview) asks questions to interlocutors (respondents) in order to get answers to them.

But not everyone knows that there is a special type of interview that allows you to find out such information that cannot be obtained using a regular interview. Such an interview is called in-depth. Just like a regular interview, it is used as a research method in a whole range of humanities and social sciences, such as marketing, public relations, communication, sociology, and others, as well as in many areas of human activity, for example, in management. personnel, journalism, etc.

In this article, we will talk about the in-depth interview and talk about the advantages it has as a research method.

Benefits of an in-depth interview

We will immediately make a small explanation that further we will point out the specific features of an in-depth interview and consider each of them in more detail.

Obtaining in-depth information from the respondent

Through in-depth interviews, it becomes possible for the interviewer to establish a more trusting relationship with their respondent, which creates the prospect of obtaining unique information that is almost impossible to obtain using other methods. In addition, in-depth interviews, as opposed to focus groups (groups of respondents consisting of 8-10 people), are always conducted one-on-one, which means that it is possible to exclude the influence of the opinions of other people on the opinion of a particular respondent.

Using an in-depth interview, you can determine the needs and motives that underlie the behavior of customers and buyers, obtain data on consumer strategies and the principles on which their choice of goods and services is based, the mechanisms that shape decision making officials, methods of overcoming various problems by employees of organizations, their expectations, values, etc.

Application of projective methods

Projective methods, for example, associations, color and drawing tests, and others like them, allow you to learn much more about the position of the respondent regarding a particular issue, as well as about his personal characteristics. And any such information can be very useful during the analysis of the materials obtained during the interview.

In addition to the above, using projective methods, it is possible to obtain from the respondent such data that is difficult to express using language means. For example, a person cannot verbally describe the design of any product that is acceptable to him, but successfully depicts it in a drawing. Projective methods also contribute to the study of associations that people have about names, logos, brands, etc.

Thanks to projective methods, an element of the game is included in the interview, which helps to reduce the emotional stress of the person involved in the interview process, and allows, as already mentioned, to obtain information of a more in-depth nature. But be that as it may, the use of projective methods in marketing research often requires the involvement of psychologists in the process, who can professionally interpret the information received.

Application of visual materials

During the in-depth interview, the interviewer has the opportunity to use all kinds of visual materials, such as packaging, display cases, photographs, posters, posters, videos, etc. In most cases, the use of such materials helps to stimulate the respondent to reasoning, more complete answers to questions and the most subjective expression of his opinion.

Studying the opinions of special categories of respondents

An in-depth interview can be used to study the consumption of specific types of goods and services, such as, for example, pet supplies, pharmaceuticals, plastic surgery, cosmetology, and others. Also this method relevant in situations where it is required to study the opinion of hard-to-reach categories of people, for example, exclusively consumers of luxury goods, and in those situations where the respondent may experience discomfort during a group discussion of goods of a specific group (contraceptives, drugs that affect potency etc.).

Now it is worth touching on the issue, so to speak, of the disadvantages of the method we are considering.

Limitations of in-depth interviews as a research method

Along with all the positive characteristics of an in-depth interview, there are certain limitations for this research method.

The personality of the interviewer affects the nature of the data obtained

Given various subjective factors, the personality of the interviewer can influence how the respondent responds. In other words, the respondent can choose a certain strategy of behavior for himself and adhere to it during the interview, without being at that time who he really is.

The researcher in the course of an in-depth interview should be as attentive and tactful as possible: he should dispose to a confidential conversation, inspire respect and trust in the interlocutor, set him up for natural behavior. He also should not be overly self-confident or express his personal judgments in the direction of the respondent himself, because. All this can affect the quality of the information received.

It is impossible to study the opinion of a large number of respondents

Unlike the usual formalized survey, the in-depth interview focuses on the study of the motivational and consumer characteristics of one person or a very small group of people, for example, a family. Thus, the research is carried out at the micro level.

A prerequisite for an in-depth interview is not a selective methodology, which means that the results obtained in its process cannot be unambiguously projected onto a larger group of people with whom an in-depth interview has not been conducted. In addition, the information that was obtained through in-depth interviews cannot be analyzed in complex mathematical ways, such as, for example, in a survey or questionnaire. An in-depth interview can only point out a trend to a researcher, not a statistic.

Study duration

If we compare in-depth interviews with focus groups, then it requires significantly more time costs, even with the same number of respondents. But here it must be remembered that the quality of the information obtained during an in-depth interview is much higher, because the respondent's answers are not influenced in any way by the opinions or statements of other people.

Difficulties in analyzing the information received

Although a whole cycle of in-depth interviews can be conducted according to the same scheme, in which questions are asked in the same way, in the process of analyzing the information received, difficulties can arise that are associated with the comparability of data and the identification of specific trends. This is mainly due to the fact that each individual case of conducting an in-depth interview is unique in its own way, and the data obtained is always subjective.

These are the main characteristics and limitations of the in-depth interview. But, summing up this material, it is impossible not to mention the technology of its implementation.

In-Depth Interview Technology

Speaking about the technology of conducting an in-depth interview, we will indicate only its key points.

Preparing the Structure of the Interview

Before proceeding with an in-depth interview, the researcher must prepare his plan, which he will be guided by in the process. The plan, in turn, should be only a list of questions that will be asked to the respondent, which distinguishes this method from a regular survey.

Selecting respondents and conducting in-depth interviews

After the interview plan is drawn up, the selection of respondents takes place and the in-depth interview itself is conducted. Its duration can be different - from 30 minutes to 2-3 hours, depending on the complexity of the interview topic, the number of questions and the depth of their study.

Basically, an in-depth interview is conducted in a specially designed room, characterized by a neutral environment, as well as good sound insulation - this is done in order to exclude any external interference.

In order to facilitate the subsequent interpretation and analysis of the received information, as well as to avoid data loss, the in-depth interview should be recorded on audio or video media.

Processing and analysis of results

Upon completion of the in-depth interview, its record is processed so that the researcher has access to the full text of the conversation. Based on this text and the impressions of the interviewer, the necessary analysis is made and a report is drawn up.

The in-depth interview as a research method is very flexible. For this reason, in practice it can be applied both as an independent method and in combination with qualitative methods (desk research, focus groups) and quantitative methods (any type of survey).

Problems of increasing the adequacy of quantitative tools.

For sociologists accustomed to working with formalized questionnaires, in-depth interviews can help in two ways. First of all, its application will help the sociologist to realize the limits of applicability and limitations of the questionnaire method. Second, an in-depth interview will effective tool checking the quality of questionnaires and at the same time a means of their refinement. Often, after the very first interviews, the researcher realizes the need for a radical reworking of the questionnaire he created.

The use of in-depth interviews in the development of sociological questionnaires will be one of the forms of a pilot survey. In connection with the data, it is advisable to make a number of remarks regarding pilot surveys in general. Domestic methodological sources traditionally indicate the need for pilot studies in the development of sociological tools, but this issue is usually given very little space and the methodological features of the ϶ᴛᴏth important stage are traditionally not disclosed enough.

A typical description of a pilot study in Russian literature looks like this: “A pilot study in sociology is a pilot study of a predominantly methodological orientation, the purpose of which is to test the quality of a tool for collecting sociological information. In the process of pilotage, a draft (model) of the methodology is developed, which is then tested in conditions close to those of a mass field study. When ϶ᴛᴏm, the measure of loss and distortion of information is clarified due to the presence of language, psychological and other barriers and those circumstances in the survey situation that were not taken into account when developing the program and research methods. Usually, when piloting, it is considered sufficient to interview 50-100 people selected in such a way that all groups of respondents that are significant for the purposes of the study would be included in the sample.

The above description is cited not only because it is typical, but also because it corresponds to the actual

domestic sociology practice. By the way, this is the actual practice. The 50-100 people mentioned above are gathered in the hall, they are given a draft questionnaire and asked to fill it out. The collected questionnaires are reviewed and analyzed. With ϶ᴛᴏm, indeed, there are certain signals that certain questions do not work well. Among such signals ᴏᴛʜᴏϲᴙ are:

a) low completion rate of some questions or a high percentage of answers like “I don’t know”, “I find it difficult to answer”. This is, perhaps, one of the main signals that the question is either incomprehensible, or affects “closed zones” in the mind of the respondent, or places too high demands on the respondent’s memory, or suffers from other similar vices;

b) in semi-closed and sometimes closed questions, respondents enter ϲʙᴏ and answer options that do not coincide with any of the closures. If the number of such answers exceeds 5-7%, then ϶ᴛᴏ is an unconditional signal to finalize the list of closures;

c) some respondents write ϲʙᴏ and explanations in the margins of the questionnaire, sometimes very lengthy. It must be remembered that such records can serve as a source for including additional questions in the questionnaire, changing its structure;

d) some respondents approach the surveying sociologists and talk with them. Sometimes these conversations turn to individual questions of the questionnaire that caused difficulties, sometimes they turn into a discussion of the entire issue raised in the questionnaire. Conversations of this kind often turn out to be useful for sociologists and influence the final development of tools, however, the established practice is that these conversations will not be a specially planned methodological stage, take place without a methodological plan developed in advance and are not strictly recorded.

Thus, it can be noted that the current practice of conducting pilot surveys, in principle, gives sociologists certain signals about how the questionnaire should be finalized. However, the real value of these signals, in general, is small. The point is that a practically working sociologist, who is familiar with the existing methodological literature and who has personally taken part in conducting several surveys, acquires the skill of avoiding blunders when compiling questionnaires. Filling out questionnaires by respondents during pilot surveys often goes “smoothly”, in the sense that respondents do not experience any particular difficulties, and the questionnaire undergoes only minor changes as a result of such pilotage. At the same time, as will be shown below, the “smoothness” of filling does not mean the high quality of the questionnaire.

Before proceeding to describe our recommendations for conducting pilot studies, it should be noted that there are, or at least should be, several types of pilot studies. It should be said that sociologists should become accustomed to the fact that the development or “finishing” of questionnaires is a complex and multi-stage process, consisting, as a rule, of 3-5, or even more, different “pilots”. In particular, not only the questionnaire can be piloted, but also, for example, sampling (i.e., checking the availability of respondents, the feasibility of the chosen procedure for their search, etc.), the survey procedure (time, place and method of organizing the survey, the duration of filling out the questionnaire ) and a number of other survey parameters. When piloting the questionnaire itself, the subject of piloting can be the questions themselves, the structure and composition of the questionnaire, as well as the research issues. Consideration of the whole complex of these problems, i.e. description various kinds pilot studies seems important, but not included in the scope of this paragraph. Its task will be to describe only certain types of aerobatics associated with the use of in-depth interviews.

To the greatest extent acceptable for a pilot study, we consider the method often used by psychologists to fill out a test or questionnaire by a respondent, “reasoning with ϶ᴛᴏm aloud.” In other words, the respondent should be invited to read the prepared version of the questionnaire and fill it out, telling the interviewer all the thoughts, associations and difficulties that come to mind. In a well-designed questionnaire, there will be few such accompanying thoughts and difficulties. Questions, the logical division of which has been completed and which are understandable to the respondent, are usually filled out immediately and do not cause any oral comments. The situation is different with all sorts of "inadequate" questions. The answer to one such question may well be a lengthy interview, which will show a complete lack of questionnaires on the issues under study.

It should be noted that many problems of the inadequacy of questions and questionnaires are covered in the domestic literature. In particular, they often talk about the limitations associated with the memory of the respondents, the narrowness of their language abilities (due to, for example, a low level of education), the personal or intimate nature of the questions, and a number of other factors. Without denying the importance of these aspects, we want to focus on the main, from our point of view, shortcoming of domestic questionnaires, namely, on a kind of “cognitive” difficulties caused by respondents with incorrectly posed questions. By "wrong" questions, we mean, in particular:

- complex questions of a large logical volume that do not "fit" into the closing list, even if the latter contains 10-15 or more items;

- questions containing various kinds of logical flaws (“double” question, contradictoryly formulated question, ambiguous in meaning, etc.);

- questions containing presumptions that contradict the knowledge or ideas of the respondent;

- questions, knowledge or ideas about which are generally absent in the mind of the respondent;

- questions in which the respondent does not find that typological case to which he himself belongs (for example, if you ask in the questionnaire who mainly takes care of the child, father or mother, but in reality the child lives with his grandmother, then the respondent, strictly speaking, does not can answer such a question, although in reality he usually answers it somehow)

To illustrate what an inadequate question is and how it works, here is the following scene taken from real sociological life (the director of a livestock farm was interviewed):

“Interviewer (reads the question of the questionnaire): Have you ever had to remember that you have introduced any innovations in the last two months?

Respondent (thinks, then asks): What is innovation?

Interviewer: Well, ϶ᴛᴏ if you have implemented something new...

Respondent (thinks, then asks): Two weeks ago I threw away two rusty galvanized bathtubs and replaced them with plastic ones. Is it an innovation?

Interviewer (thinks, then answers): Yes, perhaps ϶ᴛᴏ innovation.

Respondent (thinks, then asks): I also fired two drunks last month. Is it an innovation?

Interviewer (thinks, then answers): No, ϶ᴛᴏ is not an innovation.

Respondent (thinks, then asks): I said I replaced two tubs. Is it one innovation or two?

Interviewer (thinks, then answers): Apparently alone.

Respondent: Well, then write that one.

Interviewer: Understood. Let's move on to the next question...

Questionnaire interviews usually reveal several levels of flaws in the questionnaire. There are at least three such levels. The first level is ϶ᴛᴏ the possible inadequacy of the questionnaire to the entire problematic being studied or to the reality being studied.
In this case, a radical replacement of the entire questionnaire is required, as well as consideration of the question of whether the method of questionnaire survey is generally applicable to this (refined) problem. An example illustrating the need for such a radical replacement is given in the appendix to this paragraph. The second level is the ϶ᴛᴏ composition of questions and the logical composition of the questionnaire. In domestic textbooks, considering the problem of questionnaire composition, they write a lot about the fact that the order of questions can greatly affect the results of the survey. This is true, but in this case we are talking about something else. Speaking of composition errors, we mean the following. First of all, the questionnaire may contain both “extra” (irrelevant) blocks of questions, and, more importantly, missing, but meaningfully necessary (relevant) blocks of questions.

Secondly, as already noted in Chapter Two, the questionnaires compiled by Russian sociologists almost always suffer from insufficient logical branching, missing many typological cases that are actually widespread. It should be emphasized that the very first few interviews conducted on the basis of an a priori compiled questionnaire reveal a large number of "missing" questions of both the first and second types.

Finally, the third level is ϶ᴛᴏ the level of the questions themselves and the closure prompts contained in them. This level can be described as "fine" or final fine-tuning of the questionnaire. The list of possible flaws in the wording of questions and closures is generally described in Russian literature, but, despite ϶ᴛᴏ, shortcomings of this kind are constantly reproduced in questionnaires compiled by Russian sociologists.

Comparison of the results of questionnaire surveys (both pilot and mass) with the results of in-depth interviews on these questionnaires demonstrates that the “smoothness” or “ease” of filling out questionnaires by respondents sitting in the hall is often apparent. Practice shows that respondents in the vast majority of cases somehow answer even those questions that contain gross methodological flaws. This effect becomes understandable if we take into account that from a psychoenergetic position it is easier for a respondent to answer a question that raises doubts than to go and find out about the relationship with the persons conducting the survey. Only a free interview, in which the respondent is asked to report all the difficulties he experiences and related thoughts, can reveal how inadequate such a “smoothly” filled question can be.

As an example, we will cite an excerpt from a methodological interview conducted at the request of the author by Galina Vokhmentseva. The respondent is a young worker who served in the army with a secondary education.

“Respondent (reads the questionnaire question): WHAT IS A GOOD JOB? WHAT SHOULD SHE GIVE TO PEOPLE?

Interviewer: Do you understand the question?

Respondent: Yes, I understand.

Respondent (reads the first closing option):

1. Constantly improve.

After the respondent read the ϶ᴛᴏth prompt, the recorder recorded a 40-second pause. Then the respondent tried three times to start some phrase reflecting his opinion on this wording, but this phrase did not work out for him. Finally he said, “What does it mean to constantly improve?” I don't understand ϶ᴛᴏ. It's about upgrading your skills, right? But then it should have been written that way. And so ϶ᴛᴏ is meaningless ... "

To conclude this section, consider the issue of sampling in pilot studies. Domestic sources indicate that the sample size should be from 50 to 100 people. In our opinion, there are different types of aerobatics, and the sample size during their implementation should be different. In general, when conducting pilot studies, the principle remains valid, according to which a lower degree of formalization of the survey should also lead to a smaller sample size. It is possible, of course, to conduct 100 ϲʙᴏ interviews according to the questionnaire, but it is more expedient to proceed in stages, carrying out, as already mentioned, 3-5 pilot studies, and after each stage finalizing and correcting the tools. It seems that on the basis of a questionnaire that has never been piloted, it is enough to conduct a random interview with 5-10 respondents. As practice shows, the ϶ᴛᴏ number of conversations is more than enough to realize the need for significant revision. The next stages of pilotage may require a survey of a larger number of respondents in order to identify various typological cases not taken into account by the questionnaire, already relatively rare, but possibly constituting 10-15% in the sample. The degree of formalization of the questionnaire can probably increase with ϶ᴛᴏm, but we do not have a reflected methodological experience on this issue. In order to reduce the complexity of the study on an enlarged sample, not the entire questionnaire can be piloted, but only its individual blocks or questions. Samples for aerobatics should be compiled according to the type of quotas, so that the survey takes into account differences in role positions and, if possible, in personality types of respondents.

APPENDIX: COMPARISON OF THE RESULTS OF THE SURVEY BY THE QUESTIONNAIRE METHOD AND THE METHOD OF IN-DEPTH INTERVIEW

Let us give an example of the inadequacy of the questionnaire at the very first of the levels mentioned above, that is, at the level of its complete inadequacy of reality. Material published on http: // site
We will talk about the description of a methodical experiment set by life itself, during which the same problem was studied in parallel by two various methods: a questionnaire and an in-depth interview.

The initial order for the study was formulated in the late 70s by employees of the apparatus of the USSR Ministry of Coal Industry and consisted in studying the reasons for the very high turnover of mid-level line managers in coal mines. When passing through administrative instances (from the customer to the leadership of the VNIIugol Institute, from the leadership of the institute to the head of the sociological laboratory of the named institute), the essence of the order was significantly distorted. The word "turnover" was replaced by the more familiar to sociologists the word "staff turnover", and the word "executives" - by the more familiar "engineering and technical workers" (ITR), which include not only line managers of production, but also a large number of employees employed in workshops and in plant management as engineers, technicians, economists, standard setters, etc. As a result, the title of the topic began to sound like “Studying the reasons for the turnover of engineers in coal mines”.

The leadership of the VNIIugol Institute entrusted the development of the ϶ᴛᴏth topic to its own sociological laboratory, in which the author of this book worked, and at the same time, on the basis of an economic contract, to a group of workers of the USSR Academy of National Economy (ANH) As a result of issuing parallel tasks, a kind of “competition” arose between ANKh group and the author of this book.

The ANKh group followed the traditional questionnaire path and in a certain sense made ϶ᴛᴏ competently. The employees of the ϶ᴛᴏth group took as a basis the questionnaires developed by that time to study the reasons for the turnover of workers. These questionnaires were distinguished by a certain specificity, which was as follows. In principle, to study the causes of turnover, it would be more correct to interview people leaving the enterprise. At the same time, it is technically difficult to organize such a survey, therefore, according to the tradition dating back to the works of E. Antosenkov, Soviet sociologists studied not the reasons for layoffs, but the degree and factors of job dissatisfaction, as well as the so-called potential turnover among people working at the enterprise. Possible disadvantages of this approach will not be discussed here. It is worth saying that it is important for us that the ANE group took as a basis just such a questionnaire, declaratively aimed at studying the causes of staff turnover, but actually studying the causes of job dissatisfaction.

In order to conduct a survey of engineering and technical workers, the questionnaire, adapted for interviewing workers, required a certain alteration, taking into account the specifics of the work of engineers. On the whole, the ANKh group coped with the ϶ᴛᴏth task satisfactorily. In particular, significant differences were taken into account in the organization of wage systems for workers and engineers. In general, the questionnaire developed by this group did not contain gross methodological errors in the sense that it was quite easy for respondents to fill in and did not include questions that would confuse them. It is appropriate to note that the survey was conducted on a large sample, the results were processed on a computer, and the main result of the survey looked like this: the main reasons for the turnover of engineering staff will be low wages and poor housing. In a certain sense, this result can be considered correct, because the salary of many engineering and technical staff, including production managers, in those years was lower than that of workers, and the provision of housing was also objectively unsatisfactory (although it is difficult to say who had it). worse and who moved faster the queue for housing: workers or engineers.This and a number of other issues related to housing were left out of consideration) One way or another, the result described above outwardly looked correct and even obvious, but in fact it was colossal mistake, fundamentally incorrectly interpreting the processes of turnover and fluidity personnel the studied contingent of workers.

Let us now turn to the description of that part of the work, which was carried out by a group of researchers, which included the author of this book. On the advice of the supervisor V. Chesnokova, a series of in-depth interviews was conducted in order to clarify the issues. The first step was a conversation with the customer - a senior official of the USSR Ministry of Coal Industry. By the way, this conversation helped clarify the essence of the order and the motives for its nomination. Relevantly, the interviewee explained that the ministry was concerned about the high turnover and difficulty in recruiting production managers in coal mines. As proof, he showed printed on the computer ϲʙᴏdki, which really showed an increase in the turnover of leaders over the past years. Regarding the reasons for this phenomenon, the customer found it difficult to say anything and said that it was precisely ϶ᴛᴏ that it was extremely important to find out during the survey. Do not forget that an important result of the conversation was the clarification that the customer was interested in the problems of turnover only of production managers, and not all engineers.

After a conversation with the customer, several dozen interviews were conducted with the leaders of coal mines, mainly with directors and chief engineers. Some of the interviews collected at that time were later published in the collection Production Interviews, vol. 2". The very first conversations with the managers of the mines struck me with the complexity, tension of the production situation and the abundance of problems, which were not only described, but even posed by domestic sociologists. Further, the interviews clarified the essence of the order made by the Ministry. It certainly wasn't about staff turnover. Some kind of turnover, that is, dismissals of their own free will, took place only in the lowest position group of leaders (mining foremen), but ϶ᴛᴏ did not worry the respondents very much. At the same time, the personnel situation at the next job level, namely the position of section chiefs, which ϲᴏᴏᴛʙᴇᴏᴛʙᴇᴏᴛʙᴇᴛϲᴛʙ holds the position of shop manager in other industries, was recognized as extremely acute by almost all respondents. With ϶ᴛᴏm, it was not about staff turnover, since dismissals of their own free will were uncharacteristic for this job group and were very rare and atypical cases. High turnover rates, reflected in ministerial records, were generated by the so-called administrative turnover, i.e., the dismissal of leaders from office for failure to fulfill the plan, safety violations identified by inspections, and for various other reasons. By the way, this turnover was really very high, in some mines it reached 40 percent or more per year.

The information obtained from the in-depth interviews revealed a fundamental shortcoming of the parallel questionnaire survey. This survey, we recall, was focused on studying the reasons for the turnover of engineering and technical personnel. The main flaw of this study was that it studied the causes of the phenomenon, which in reality does not exist. In-depth interviews immediately revealed that instead of fluidity there is administrative turnover, and ϶ᴛᴏ is a fundamentally different phenomenon, generated by completely different factors and reflecting a completely different problem.

The new phenomenon of administrative turnover discovered in the course of the study required clarification of the reasons for its occurrence and functional role. Understanding these issues did not come immediately. The first signal that drew attention to itself was the fact that a small number of interviewed managers (about 10-15%), unlike the majority of their colleagues, characterized the production and personnel situation at their mines as relatively calm. This served as the basis for putting forward a hypothesis about the existence of a relationship between the degree of intensity of the plan and the turnover of the personnel of managers. Further research, as well as the study of literature (mainly memoirs of leaders and ministerial workers of the Soviet era) made it possible to form the following concept.

In a planned economy, there is one problem that is difficult to solve. If the production unit did not fulfill the plan, the higher authorities have a question: did ϶ᴛᴏ happen due to objective reasons due to lack of resources or due to poor leadership? It is clear that in the first case it is extremely important to allocate additional resources, and in the second - to change the leader. Over the 70 years of Soviet power, all attempts to learn how to solve this problem objectively, on the basis of taking into account production capacities and the technical and industrial financial plans drawn up on their basis, ended in failure. Instead of ϶ᴛᴏgo, the administrative economy invented a different, in a way effective, albeit cynical mechanism. Its essence lies in the fact that production is annually given increasing planned targets using the “from what has been achieved” method. The issuance of such a task is reinforced by the threat of sanctions against the heads of enterprises in case of non-compliance. In Stalin's time, such a threat could be a camp or execution. In the following decades, the sanctions eased, and the main one was the threat of administrative removal from office.

In the dynamics of ϶ᴛᴏt, the mechanism operated as follows. The production capacity of the enterprise will not be a constant value, they grow as a result of capital investments and fall due to wear and tear of equipment. To the greatest extent, a typical graph of the dynamics of the plant's production capacity is a ϶ᴛᴏ arc with ascending and descending branches. If the plant is relatively new or has recently been reconstructed, it usually has certain real reserves for increasing its production capacities due to a fuller load of equipment, connection of new unit capacities, etc. Gradually, these reserves are exhausted, and the curve reflecting the dynamics of capacities, from ascending becomes horizontal. Then the equipment begins to wear out and, if it is not updated in time, the power curve will go down.

At the stage of increasing production capacities, the practice of increasing plans “from what has been achieved” generally justifies itself, partly even being a stimulator of production growth. Problems begin to arise at the "horizontal" stage, when the main reserves for increasing capacity have been exhausted, but the planned requirements continue to grow. Note that, nevertheless, at the ϶ᴛᴏm stage, the discrepancy between the dynamics of capacities and the dynamics of requirements is still not so great, and for some time (several years) the management of the enterprise can by hook or by crook get out of the situation. Finally, when the equipment enters the wear phase, the curves of capacity and planned requirements diverge sharply, forming "scissors". At this moment, the higher planning authorities begin a real "beating" of the management of enterprises. There is, so to speak, a “check for lice”: the question is clarified whether additional resources are really needed to further increase production, or whether it is possible to get by with an increase in administrative pressure on management, threats, and a change of leaders. And only after two or three directors are replaced, and production continues to work worse and worse, the fact that the company's capabilities have been exhausted is considered proven. At the ϶ᴛᴏt moment, the cycle begins anew. A new (third or fourth) director is appointed to the enterprise, and they try to find a truly outstanding manager. It is important to note that at the same time, the company is allocated additional capital investments, increase the salary fund and create other preferential conditions, thanks to which new director can bring the company out of the crisis. After a certain time (depending on the volume of resource injection ϶ᴛᴏt, the period can be from 5 to 15 years), production will again enter a state of crisis, and again the director and lower managers will have to endure humiliating and unfair accusations of "inability" to fulfill the state task (in Stalin's years instead of "inability" appeared the words "sabotage" and "sabotage")

Of course, only the most general scheme is described above, which in reality could vary widely. In particular, it would be very interesting to study those counter-strategies that leaders used to survive. Partially, such mechanisms are described in the article by S. Pavlenko “Informal managerial interactions”. At the same time, our scheme should not be considered purely conventional, because in the history of the Soviet economy it was used literally many times. In particular, in Stalin's time, the scenario described above was realized in ferrous metallurgy, and possibly in other branches of heavy industry. From 1930 to 1935 production capacity, plans and volumes of production in the iron and steel industry grew rapidly under the influence of large-scale purchases of equipment in the West. Then the purchases were stopped, the equipment began to age, but the plans continued to increase at the previously achieved pace. The growth of planned pressure forced directors of enterprises to violate technology, which accelerated the depreciation of capacities. As a result, in 1938 there was a major underfulfillment of the plan, after which about half of all directors, chief engineers and lower production managers were replaced in the industry. As far as can be understood from the quoted source, as well as from A. Beck's book "The New Appointment", most of them were arrested. According to a similar scenario, the arrests of collective farm chairmen were carried out in the late 1940s and early 1950s during their "unprecedented turnover".

In subsequent years (Stalin and post-Stalin), this scenario was repeatedly implemented in various industries. We do not have systematic data on the entire national economy, but there is no doubt that at the end of the 70s the coal industry was in a state of production and personnel crisis, N. Khrushchev “cut off” capital investments in this industry, and the USSR Council of Ministers continued to increase production plans.

The last large-scale attempt to increase production volumes by increasing administrative pressure on factories was made by Yu. Andropov. It is worth noting that he achieved an increase in the turnover of leaders by approximately 30%, but the real volumes of production did not increase from ϶ᴛᴏgo, and in general, the campaign he carried out had a rather negative impact on the national economy, giving rise to a kind of “unscheduled rush job” in it with all the characteristic for emergency workers the consequences. Yu. Andropov did not have the opportunity to make large resource injections into the economy, and the country's leadership simply did not have other levers of influence within the administrative system.

It should be noted that the relationship described above between the degree of intensity of production plans and the turnover of managers is also found in the intrashop structure of factories, since the planned loading of shops, as it turned out as a result of the survey, is extremely uneven. At every enterprise there are so-called difficult workshops, which constantly fail to fulfill their plans. According to our measurements, the turnover of managers in such workshops is 2-3 times higher than the turnover of managers in other workshops of factories.

Although the political and economic situation that has changed in the country has deprived the above results of practical significance, their scientific significance, from our point of view, remains, since such effects can occur (and, apparently, arise) in any large administrative systems, including, for example, large corporations. It seems that in the 1970s Russian sociology could have had time to make many interesting discoveries if it had not put on the blinkers of formalized questionnaires.

The methodological significance of the above example lies essentially in the fact that the in-depth interview applied at the initial stage of the study revealed the need to radically change the scope of the study, bringing it closer to reality. Material published on http: // site

Sociologists who are not experienced with in-depth interviews often express concern that the lack of quantitative data makes the results of the study unreliable or, in best case, unproven. This is wrong for a number of reasons, in particular because if the researcher has a qualitative concept, the operationalization of its main variables is traditionally not difficult. In particular, the questionnaires developed by the author included questions about the number of Last year reprimands, length of service in the position held, real working hours, etc. At the same time, it is also important to note that many concepts include such variables that can be objectively measured, but not by the method of questionnaire survey. A frequent disadvantage of domestic questionnaires will be that with their help they try to obtain certain quantitative data, the correctness and reliability of which can only be ensured by statistical measurements.