The first part of this series gave an overview how qualitative data and customer development go hand in hand. There are different methods to gather qualitative data. In most books and articles about customer development, the authors (implicitly) describe the method of conducting semi-structured interviews – as I did in the first part of this series. Another possibility to gain qualitative data is through ethnography. Ethnography is not merely an additional option. It is considered to be the hour of birth of qualitative research. Originally stemming from anthropology, Conklin (1968: 172) defined ethnography nearly a decade ago as:

            “[A] long period of intimate study and residence in a well-defined community employing a wide range of observational techniques including prolonged face-to-face contact with members of local groups, direct participation in some of the group’s activities, and a greater emphasis on intensive work with informants than on the use of documentary or survey data.”

This intimate study and intense work with informants is conducted in the so-called field – hence called field study. Field study means data gathered from conversations, behaviors and interactivities happen in a natural context. In other words, an ethnographer captures data in genuine situations (e.g. the natural setting where your customers use your product). Thus, the data is more authentic than in surveys, interviews or study groups. This is the huge advantage of ethnography. The contextual data is also called thick descriptions (Geertz, 1973) as it enables you to capture rich details of the observed processes.

So, you might wonder what it has to do with practice or how it helps to run your startup? Here are the facts: more and more companies are starting to grasp the value of ethnography and ethnographers for customer development, product development and user experience (UX) design. Some examples:

• Facebook was looking for an ethnographer to understand what Facebook actually means to its users.
• High-tech company PARC (orig. Xerox Palo Alto Research Center), which developed laser printing, Ethernet and an awful lot more lists ethnography as a core competencies.
• Ethnography is also used to ethnography to improve the user experience (UX) of customers

The data gained through ethnography can be seen as complementary to Big Data. “Big Data produces so much information that it needs something more to bridge and/or reveal knowledge gaps. That’s why ethnographic work holds such enormous value in the era of Big Data” as Tricia Wang aptly points out. She coined the term Thick Data which she defines as “ethnographic approaches that uncover the meaning behind Big Data visualization and analysis.”

The main reason for ethnography’s usefulness lies in the participant-as-observant role in the field. By just hanging around, you immediately see how people use your product. The data you gain is especially insightful once the observed got used to you for “hanging around”. If people don’t mind your appearance very much, you gain operational data (i.e., natural flow of conversations and activities) instead of presentational data (i.e., trying to maintain a certain appearance in front of you). Gaining thick and operationaldata is the true advantage of ethnography in comparison to other methods. You gather data while it is happening (in contrast to surveys and interviews, for example).

However, as with any method there are also some disadvantages. Ethnography is very time-consuming. This is because the observed (a.k.a. informants) have to get used to you – otherwise no operational data for you! Depending on your ethnographic research design and research question(s), it can take 50, 60 to several hundred of hours as you also have to analyze your newly gained Thick Data. And there’s another problem. It won’t be easy to find users or companies who agree that an outsider just hangs around in their office for a few hours or recording some videos.

There are some tricks, I used during my PhD to mitigate the disadvantages. One is to become friends and help others with daily task. Some researchers reported this has helped to gain acceptance in the field. Another advice is, once you reflected on some data, to ask longer (follow-up) questions naturally while having lunch together.

The good thing about ethnography is that you can almost immediately start some small pilot studies for practicing. Go somewhere and observe what people are doing (e.g. how they approach, use and choose tickets on ticket machine). After some pilot testing, you might start with just one single user and build a user persona around him. Expect to gain unexpected results.

This is a two-part series why qualitative data is fundamental for understanding entrepreneurship and startups. Part one  discusses qualitative data in general.

References:

Conklin, H. 1968. Ethnography. In D. Sills (Ed.), International Encyclopedia of Social Sciences, Vol. 5: 115–208. New York: Free Press.

Geertz, C. 1973. The Interpretation of Cultures. New York: Basic Books.

Image Credit: Sprout Labs