An interview is a personal exchange of information or, as the name inter-view suggests, an interchange of views between two or more people on a topic of mutual interest. Interviews can do what surveys cannot, which is to explore issues in-depth. There are four types of interviews that can be used for conducting the in-depth interview, and this research will use the standardised open-ended interview type.
This type is the most suitable one, as the interview questions are determined in advance, and all interviewees are asked the same questions. Both will increase the comparability of responses. An open-ended question to open a discussion will be embedded in the interview to overcome this interview type’s lack of flexibility.
The choice of 12 participants for the interview sessions was informed by attaining saturation and methodological rigour. According to Ghauri et al. (2020), a sample size of between 8 and 20 participants is enough for a qualitative study to attain rigour. Furthermore, 12 participants in this study were considered enough to collect enough information to the point that no new themes or ideas could emerge even with more participants in the study.
| No. | Participants | Title | Company | Country |
| 1 | Daniel Lambert | Vice President | Benchmark Consulting | Canada |
| 2 | Thiagarajan Venkatraman (Thiagu) | Senior Project Manager | Publishing Company | India |
| 3 | Almudena Rodriguez | Business Agility Consultant | Rodriguez Pardo & Assocs | Germany |
| 4 | Jürgen Horak | Senior Executive Consultant | Former GM at Dimension Data | Austria |
| 5 | Chantal Paquin | Architecte d’entreprise | Bombardier Recreational Product | Canada |
| 6 | Peter Bergmann | CEO, Senior IT-Expert | elleta München GmbH | Germany |
| 7 | Matthias Traugott | CEO | Punctdavista AG | Switzerland |
| 8 | Thomas Pränger | CEO | VALpro Business Software AG | Germany |
| 9 | Lars Wentorp | CIO | Hamburg Port Authority | Germany |
| 10 | Martin Hager | CEO | Retarus GmbH | Germany |
| 11 | Fernando Scheps | Business Line Hub Lead | Accenture | Switzerland |
| 12 | Christoph Pirringer | CEO | CodeFactory GmbH | Austria |
As the primary research method, semi-structured interviews in this study enabled the research to build rapport with every participant. Also, the interview approach ensured the researcher created flexibility during the interview sessions, thereby seeking richer responses to complex and personal issues related to digital transformation and their impact on organisations and/ or companies. Through probes, participants were encouraged to detail their responses and clarify their statements, leading to richer responses. All the interview sessions were scheduled at a convenient time for every participant. The duration of each interview session varied and lasted between 50 minutes and 90 minutes.
All interviews have been recorded, transcribed and coded with MAXQDA (https://www.maxqda.com). The result of the coding exercise is shown in the image below.
It provides you with a good overview of the focus of each participant during the interview. The interview content has been taken into the study and into the published book as well.