A hermeneutic phenomenological framework respects the study material as a descriptive element. The material is not “data” of which the analysis will be conducted. Instead, the material is a description of the phenomenon where the interpretation takes place. The idea of data collection could be, in fact, replaced with a notion of data accumulation. (Heinilä 2014, 273.) With this in mind, the study material will be referred to as “data” in this report.
Data was collected through semi-structured thematic interviews within three weeks in June-July 2020. Interviews are regarded as a flexible way to gather information. The interviewer is able to repeat the questions, correct any possible misunderstandings, explain the wordings, and participate in the discussion with the interviewee. The interviewer is able to decide in which order to present the questions, and it is also possible, although not highly recommended, to observe the interviewee. (Tuomi & Sarajärvi 2018, 85.)
A typical feature of a semi-structured thematic interview is that the themes of the questions are known, but the exact questions and their order are not necessarily pre-determined (Hirsjärvi et al. 2013, 208). A thematic interview highlights the participants’ interpretations of the topic, the meanings they assign to the topic, and the meanings emerging through the communication (Hirsjärvi & Hurme 2018, 48). Hirsjärvi and Hurme (2018, 48) point out that there is not only one experience of the phenomenon, but all experiences, thoughts, feelings, and beliefs can be explored using this method. Using certain themes gives the interviewer more room for manoeuvring and allows the voice of the participant to come through loud and clear.
The themes for the interviews in this study were created on the basis of the research questions. The list of themes were sent to the interviewees beforehand, together with the link to the online meeting. The most important goal during the interviews was to collect as much information and as many experiences and different meanings as possible of the phenomenon.
For this purpose, forwarding the themes of the interview to the participants before the interview was justified and recommended. Ethically, it seemed important to explain to the participants what the interview was about, and to clarify the purpose and procedure of the research in advance. (Tuomi & Sarajärvi 2018, 85−86.) The themes for the interviews can be found in Appendices 1 (in Finnish) and 2 (translated in English).
The process for data collection started with a discussion with the Finnish Coaches Association in the beginning of June 2020, on how to find the interviewees. The Association suggested that some coaches from different ball sports and different areas of Finland should be contacted directly and asked if they are willing to participate. Tuomi and Sarajärvi (2018, 86) mention that one advantage of an interview, compared to e.g. an internet survey, is that it is possible to select persons with the best knowledge or experience of the topic for the interviews.
The aim of the participant selection was to recruit interviewees who had accumulated lived experiences of ethical leadership in coaching and who were willing to talk about their experiences. A further aim of the recruitment was to find participants who are diverse enough to produce rich and unique stories of the experiences. The final number of participants could not be determined in advance, as the goal was to continue the interviews until it was no
longer possible to reach a clearer understanding of the essence of the experiences through further discussions. (Creswell & Poth 2018, 282; Laverty 2003, 29.)
The original plan was to recruit 5 to 10 interviewees. An invitation letter in Finnish (Appendix 3) together with the information letter and data protection protocol (in Finnish) (Appendix 4) was forwarded by Ms. Tuunainen of the Finnish Coaches Association to her list of 21 female coaches representing 11 different ball sports on June 18, 2020. As a researcher I had no influence on who were selected or which sport they represented. Out of this batch, three interviews were set for the following days, and a spread sheet was created of the appointments to keep track on the details agreed on and to gather the contact information of the participants. A reminder was sent to the same list of coaches by Ms.
Tuunainen on July 3, 2020, and 11 new coaches were contacted on the same day. Two new interviews were set on the calendar from this batch. One spot for an interview was kept in reserve to meet a possible need for further material, as one coach was on holiday and without an internet access until the end of the month.
The frame and execution of the interviews was tested with one coach before moving on to the primary interviews. This preliminary interview helped to determine the final wordings, the order of the themes, and the format of the questions, which all could be modified after the interview to improve the fluency of the interviews. The preliminary interview also helped to estimate the length of time to be allocated to each interview. (Hirsjärvi & Hurme 2018, 72.) A preliminary interview was conducted with an internationally recognized female coach from outside the target group on June 24, 2020. As this informant did not match the target group the material and the findings of the preliminary interview could not be added to the analysis of the study. The discussion, however, gave some preliminary insights into the findings and for the later analysis.
Five Finnish female ball sports coaches were interviewed for the study. The coaches had gone through the most common pathway to coaching, from athletes to coaching (Mallett et al. 2009, 331). During or after winding down or finishing up their own careers as athletes, they had started to coach juniors or adults. Their coaching experience varied from 5 to 20 years, which also shows that the coaches had already been more or less actively involved in instructing their others during their own careers as athletes.
Two of the coaches had completed a university level sports education. One coach had completed a vocational coaching education at a Sports Institute, and two of the coaches had completed the Urheilijasta Valmentajaksi [From Athlete to Coach] education offered by the Finnish Coaches Association. Four of the coaches had studied coaching within National Sport Federations, completing the first, second or the third level on the curriculum of the sport. Two of the coaches had also studied coaching abroad.
The first interview took place on June 24, 2020 and the fifth on July 7, 2020. The downside of conducting interviews in a normal face-to-face setting is that it takes time and is expensive. The interviews must be transcribed for analysis, which takes more time than the interview itself. However, in this study, due to the global pandemic and social distancing recommendations, there was no real need to travel for the interviews, and all the interviews were conducted via Microsoft Teams online conferencing tool. The interviews were recorded with Olympus Audio Recorder WS-853. The audio recorder was placed on top of the computer speakers, making the recording sound clear of any disruptions. The audio files were then uploaded from the recorder to a local folder on laptop, and back-up copies were uploaded to the personal University of Eastern Finland OneDrive folder.
The interview process was held as close to the face-to-face experience as possible. The participants were asked to describe their experiences of the topic openly and in detail, in concrete terms, without any attempt to simulate what they thought they had experienced.
The questions were open-ended in nature, with a follow-up discussion led by the participant.
(Laverty 2003, 29.) Some adapted scenarios of the PISC-Q (Thompson & Dieffenbach 2016) were also discussed together with the interviewees in order to introduce them to the complex context of ethical leadership and supported to navigate their mindset towards the topic. This is in line with a reference to van Manen (1997) by Laverty (2003, 29) where the importance of paying attention to silence and absence of speaking is supported, as “it is herein that one may find the self-evident or the taken for granted”.
Short one-to-two-word notes were taken during the interview, to highlight the interviewees’
words. Additional questions outside the agenda were asked to keep the discussion running and to the point. Leading questions were avoided, but especially during the last two interviews it was extremely difficult to try to keep the slowly emerging preliminary themes out of the discussion. At the end of each interview, the brief notes of the researcher’s initial
reactions to the points raised were discussed. Seeking participant feedback serves as a validation strategy for accuracy of the representation of their experience, and their views of the credibility of the findings (Creswell & Poth 2018, 261).
The interviews were conducted in Finnish, in the participants’ native language. The three selected PISC-Q scenarios had been translated in Finnish by the interviewer, and it was also informed to the interviewees that the scenarios had their origins in US high school sports setting, which might not be similar to the Finnish sports setting. However, the particular scenarios discussed in the context of the interviews were selected because the author felt that they could also be found to exist in the field of the target group.
An environment of safety and trust was established and maintained from the first contact onwards. All aspects of ethical guidelines and standards of research, including strict confidentiality and assigning aliases to protect the participants’ privacy and not disclosing the identities of the participants were taken into consideration and complied with both during interviews and throughout the process. (Kafle 2013, 197; Laverty 2003, 29.) The audio files were coded at the first stage containing the sport and the first name of the interviewee, and the date of the interview.
Transcriptions of the audio files were ordered from Tutkimustie Oy, a Tampere-based company, which offers transcription and other services for researchers in a reliable and trustworthy manner. The terms and conditions and the data protection protocol of the firm ensured that the files were handled with utmost care and confidentiality. The five audio files, total of 256 minutes were transcribed flawlessly within a couple of days, and a comparison between the audio files and the 41-paged transcriptions, revealed no discrepancies of quality or contents. The audio files were deleted from the recorder, from the local folder on the laptop and from the OneDrive folder on July 12, 2020, in compliance with the data protection protocol of the study (Appendix 4). The transcription files and the original audio files were deleted from Tutkimustie web service on July 14, 2020.
The finished transcriptions were re-coded by using letters A, B, C, D and E to maintain the anonymity of the interviewees during the analysis and reporting process. The codes were added to the spreadsheet, which contained the dates and times of the interviews, and names
and emails of the participants, and which would serve as a code book from there on. The file was saved on local folder on laptop, and the back-up on the personal UEF OneDrive folder.