I would not necessarily suggest focus groups---you can read more about them to see if they're a viable option, but interview people one-on-one may make more sense, since you're looking at "competitive capabilities and performance of the companies" and people may be hesitant to truly speak their mind in front of other co-workers.

Private interview sessions between the researcher and the participant could yield more detailed information on what's actually happening in the company.

I would suggest an exploratory study design.

Focus group is an instrument that could be used as apart of any qualitative research design. It could either be used in phenomenology, ethnography, descriptive, exploratory, case study, historical, grounded theory qualitative research designs, etc.

I think DEA (Data Envelopment Analysis) is applicable. The following book and included software (DEASolver) is good to start with. Briefly, DEA s a linear programming based technique for measuring the relative performance of organisational units where the presence of multiple inputs and outputs makes comparisons difficult.

Cooper, William W., Seiford, Lawrence M., Tone, Kaoru, A Comprehensive Text with Models, Applications, References and DEA-Solver Software, 2nd ed. 2007, 490 p.

I think Focus Group and Thematic analysis techniques are good for qualitative analysis. Based on codes we can do a comparative analysis easily.

You can adopt case survey method for qualitative data. Refer Yin(2003)

Hello Mr. Mohsen. I suppose you would rather use case study implementing a mixture of practices in order to collect data such as semi-structured interviews with personnel, executives, managers and clients of the companies before and after AMT applied regarding the quality of performance and competitiveness, diaries and observation. It should be noted It is not an easy effort overall because as far as I am concerned this type of research is usually conducted carrying out quantitative methodologies such as experimental or quasi-experimental designs so you should first of all justify the reasons you want to conduct a qualitative study. The main advantage however is you could explore things holistically, benefit from studying numerous perspectives and aspects related to performance and generally, study things in greater depth than in a quantitative study. Good luck!

Also please note I agree with Muhammad Imran Babar that thematic analysis is appropriate for this kind or research. It could allow for comparison between the themes focused on performance and competitiveness emerging before and after adopting AMT in the company.

Dear Andronikos Kaliris, Thank you and all dears for advices. I actually do case study in a specific company, and for gathering data and information for analysis, I’ll use firm's documents and also interviews with company managers. But for analysis data, I’m looking for a proper method that be useful for this qualitative research (case study).

Using thematic analysis can be beneficial for many people completing qualitative research for the first time.

Although beginners can use it, another suggestion would be to use systematic text condensation (Kirsti Malterud). She outlines each of the four steps involved in the analysis, allowing a novice qualitative researcher to easily digest the information.

Her paper is entitled Systematic text condensation: a strategy for qualitative analysis. It is published in the Scandinavian Journal of Public Health (2012) and can be downloaded from scholar.google.com.

I would not necessarily suggest focus groups---you can read more about them to see if they're a viable option, but interview people one-on-one may make more sense, since you're looking at "competitive capabilities and performance of the companies" and people may be hesitant to truly speak their mind in front of other co-workers.

Private interview sessions between the researcher and the participant could yield more detailed information on what's actually happening in the company.

Michael B. Wells, thank you for your suggestion and points, it will be useful.

Have a look at using focus groups in an Appreciative Enquiry methodology...definitely a positive way to go if you are exploring company performance. Suggest Cooperriders work

Here is a suggested approach in response to the question for this thread.

To evaluate the competitive capability and performance of companies, you may find it helpful look for convex sets.    Let X be the set of all points in an n-dimensional real vector space.   And let each competitive capability have real-valued features that determine the coordinates of a point in the space X.    A set in A is convex, provided the line segment connecting each pair of points x, y in X is contained in A.   Then view a set A as set of feature vectors representing the competitive capabilities of a company.   It the set A is convex, then that says a company's performance capabilities are connected and tightly woven.   Convexity in this case suggests that a company perfomance capabilities are strongly related rather than loosely connected.   In other words, convexity in this case suggests optimum company performance capability.

A similar model of the convexity of sets representing company performance.

Yin's approach to case study is a highly rigorous and valuable method that is suitable for program evaluation.  Yin has used it to evaluate several government programs (primarily education) in the  U.S.

To answer the question exhaustively would perhaps  require writing a book... But, hey - people have already done that.

To do any kind of quantitative analysis one needs data (of appropriate kind), hence need to define the metrics relevant to the objective of the analysis. A good primer on these is, for example:

• Bernard Marr, Key Performance Indicators. The 75 measures every manager needs to know, Pearson (published with FT Publishing), 2012

I also found useful these three book(lets) by Bob Frost, published by Measurement International:

• Designing Metrics: Crafting Balanced Measures for Managing Performance (2007)
• Measuring Performance : Using the new metrics to deploy strategy and improve performance (2000)
• Conducting Assessments: Evaluating Programs, Facilities, Agencies and Organizations (2011)

To use any of these ideas in manufacturing industry, a good starting point is a 2002 HBR paper by Gene Goodson Read a Plant - Fast:

• http://hbr.org/2002/05/read-a-plant-fast/ar/1

and (usually) annually published industry benchmarking reports, like, for example:

• The Harbour Report (https://www.theharbourreport.com/login.html) - automotive
• Gartner Supply Chain Top 25 (http://www.gartner.com/technology/supply-chain/top25.jsp).

For a good measure I would also throw in these two books:

• Joseph Martino, R&D Project Selection, Wiley, 1995
• Douglas Hubbard, How to Measure Anything: Finding the Value of Intangibles in Business, Wiley, 2010

Hope that helps,

ZJP

I agree with Cathryn. On very uncertain question: "What chances of this boy to win game in chess". It is necessary to know something about the boy from his past (it can be quantitative and qualitative data). To look at the boy: before game; in game; after game. Pressure and pulse is better to measure precisely, and its attitude towards rivals and judicial procedures; the picture of the world, values and so on it is better to estimate qualitative methods (interview; online behavior and so on)

I agree that you need to assess whether focus group discussion may not be a viable option. In my current research study where I also evaluate the performance of  municipalities, I use both focus groups and one-on-one interviews. however, I also use "audited" performance reports from the Office of the Auditor-General to measure performance of municipalities. You too may consider complimenting your chosen strategy with audit reports, especially when your research project also assess the level of financial performance of the companies. We cannot only rely on "subjective" public perception to explore companies' performance.

Any qualitative method will always have an element of bias. Since the inputs and observations are based on individual's perception, there exists a chance for vision colored by their own "contextual parameters" Having said, a large group doing assessment will cancel out any such bias as interactions will result in consensus gravitating towards mean.

However, any strong and opinionated personality in such groups would forcefully, direct the discussion towards the areas of his her interest  leading to loss of objectivity , sometimes. 

While I subscribe to Focus groups on such studies, I would  choose a large enough group to get diverse views for discussion but not large to blow up the objective.