Data collection

For collection of the data, I conducted three rounds of two-hour, semi-open interviews with each case company (along with numerous informal discussions over coffee or during meeting breaks). Each round of interviews lasted two to four days, usually involving two to four interviews per day, each of which lasted between one and two hours. All interviews were recorded and transcribed, amounting to 13 two-hour interviews with Volvo Group at its headquarters in Sweden within one year, and 17 two-hour interviews with Scania AB at its headquarters in Sweden within one year. The respondents were carefully selected as key people in each company who would also be knowledgeable about the issues in question. For their selection, I presented recommendations of profiles and job descriptions, and the heads of the standardization departments then assisted me with identification of those persons. The selected respondents held various positions, namely representatives of the standardization units, technical experts, local managers, and higher-level managers. Hence, the interviewees also had different areas of responsibility and job descriptions, which provided an unbiased picture and a compilation of stakeholder voices. The respondents were interviewed individually, providing an opportunity for cross-comparisons of their answers. Table 4 lists the interviewees from each company, the dates of their interviews, and their positions. A more detailed illustration regarding construction of the interview guides is provided in the following sections.

Besides the formal interviews, informal conversations with employees and local managers served as an immense source of valuable input for this study. In particular, during lunch and coffee breaks I enjoyed having the opportunity to converse with knowledgeable people and make “off-the-record” requests for additional insights or even (indirectly—that is, without naming names or quoting colleagues) triangulate information collected through the formal interviews. Following these informal discussions, I made notes that I kept in my data archive, and very often (when fitting and fruitful) incorporated those insights into following interviews and discussions. For instance, such insights helped me formulate subsequent interview questions, as well as request interview appointments with specific individuals within the case companies.

Table 4

List of interviews.

COMPANY INTERVIEW

ROUND INTERVIEW DATE RESPONDENT’S POSITION

Scania First June 2013 Standardization engineer

Scania First June 2013 Standardization engineer

Scania First June 2013 Standardization engineer

Scania First June 2013 Standardization engineer

Scania Second September 2013 Area specialist

Scania Second September 2013 Manager

Scania Second September 2013 Manager

Scania Second September 2013 Area specialist

Scania Second September 2013 Area specialist

Scania Second September 2013 Standardization manager

Volvo First November 2013 Area specialist

Volvo First November 2013 Manager

Volvo First November 2013 Manager

Volvo Second December 2013 Standardization engineer

Volvo Second December 2013 Standardization manager

Volvo Second December 2013 Standardization engineer

Volvo Third August 2014 Standardization engineer

Volvo Third August 2014 Area specialist

Volvo Third August 2014 Manager

Volvo Third August 2014 Manager

Volvo Third August 2014 Standardization manager

Volvo Third August 2014 Manager

Scania Third September 2014 Standardization engineer

Scania Third September 2014 Manager

Scania Third September 2014 Standardization manager

Scania Third September 2014 Standardization engineer

Scania Third September 2014 Manager

Scania Third December 2015 Former CEO

In other words, the informal discussions, although not recorded or transcribed, added useful insights to my overall view of the companies and their processes.

A number of additional sources were also utilized, particularly for reasons of reliability. For instance, throughout the whole process of data collection, an open eye was kept on reports, archival data, and public announcements made by

the companies, while I also had the opportunity to study a number of internal company documents, such as project plans and policy documents—many of which are not available to the public. These contributed to my overall understanding of processes and circumstances within the organizations.

Moreover, throughout the first and second rounds of interviews in each company, I participated in whole-day standardization and planning meetings.

During those meetings, I observed the ongoing discussions and took detailed notes while also recording them.

A supplementary source of contextual understanding in this study came from regular attendance at various types of standardization meetings; even before initiation of the empirical study within the companies, I had the opportunity to participate in a number of meetings of standardization bodies—for example, ISO and SIS committee meetings, as well as policy discussions regarding the future of standards and standardization within European Committee for Standardization (CEN) and Teknikföretagen. Once again—despite the fact that structured interviews were not conducted at this stage—I was able to spend plenty of time in discussion with the meetings’ participants, during breaks, lunches, and social events, which carved, from a very early stage, my overall understanding of standardization-related issues. I consider this a valuable experience that arguably benefitted my own empirical study. To name the most obvious example, through this experience I built a necessary pre-understanding that proved helpful in conducting communications with people in the companies later. Thereafter, when the collection of empirical material was initiated within the companies, I attended further standardization meetings (referring both to internal standardization meetings with the companies, as well as ISO working groups in which my case companies were participating). I even requested to be included in the e-mail discussions of the participants, which was approved, and this allowed me to follow the ongoing processes and discussions over a long period of time (approximately three years).

Finally, as part of a large research group within the arena of standards and standardization, I had the opportunity to discuss my own and others’ empirical work on a regular basis and share knowledge and insights. Towards the final part of my project (once I already had preliminary findings and conclusions), I partook in a number of workshops with practitioners (again including the case companies, as well as companies from other industries, such as Alfa Laval, Ericsson, Tetra Pak, Atlas Copco, Xylem Water Solutions Global Services AB, Cadenza Software AB, and SIS), where I had the chance to “test” those findings and discuss them with a plethora of practitioners, from a range of industries.

3.8.1 Theoretical base

As mentioned in the previous section, the study’s theoretical base, which of course also formed the base for developing the interview guides, entails two streams of literature, namely strategic management literature (e.g., Barney, 1991;

Penrose, 1959; Peteraf, 1993; Peteraf & Barney, 2003; Kraaijenbrink et al., 2010; Powell & Arregle, 2007; Williamson, 1991) and standards and standardization literature (e.g., Betancourt & Walsh, 1995; Arthur, 1989;

Schilling, 1998; Schilling, 2002; Leiponen & Helfat, 2010; Jensen & Webster, 2009; Choi et al., 2004; van den Ende, van de Kaa, den Uijl, & de Vries, 2012), since specific literature on a standardization management framework has not been conducted to date. Hence, the aforementioned streams of literature formed the point of departure for the preliminary framework, and subsequently guided the construction of questions covering the various theoretical concepts involved in the framework.

When writing the interview guides, I was cautious in rewording the theoretical concepts in operational questions to ensure that I would be able reach to the respondents and did not sound “too academic” or as if I was “speaking a different language.” For instance, instead of asking about organizational inertia or technological lock-out, I asked how easily changes are materialized in the company or whether they are concerned of staying out of market.

3.8.2 Interview process

The overall course of each interview largely depended on the position of the interviewee. At the start of every interview, I asked the respondent to describe his or her job description and responsibilities, which gave me a fairly good picture of which questions I should address to that particularly individual—that is, it enabled me to tailor the interview guide to the specific respondent. In addition, in order to ensure that I would receive accurate and relevant replies, I stressed right at the beginning that if some questions were not relevant to that person’s work, they could let me know and I would move to another question.

However, I remained vigilant of potential misunderstandings and rephrased the questions where needed to ensure that communication with the respondent was accurate and we were on the same page. For instance, I often asked several rephrased questions for each theoretical concept.

Generally, the process of tailoring the interview guide continued throughout the duration of the interviews, as the discussion was evolving. This ensured that the most relevant information was extracted from each respondent. This was an aim from the beginning of the study, which also relates to the fact that semi-open questions were constructed; that is, while the structure was predetermined, to ensure that the basic theoretical concepts were covered, the semi-open setting also offered the benefit of allowing the respondent to initiate additional topics (Bryman & Bell, 2011).

3.8.3 Interview guides

Each interview round aimed to meet different objectives, which resulted in a dissimilar base for the construction of the interview guides.

3.8.3.1 First interview round

Regarding the first round of interviews in each company, the foremost aim was to grasp how standardization is organized within the companies, which led to a focus on the overall structure of processes and activities and connection to strategic implications and rationales. Interviews were mainly with standardization engineers—that is, members of the standardization units—and managers. The rationale for this was that standardization engineers were expected to be the most well informed about the processes and functions of corporate standardization, while input from a number of managers would complement information on the strategic connections. However, the same questions were posed to both standardization engineers and managers, in order to cross-compare their (possibly variant) views and replies. This round can be seen as a pilot study that mainly aimed towards getting to know the companies and formulate an understanding of the contextual factors and circumstances in the organizations. A more detailed account of the list of questions is provided in Appendix I.

3.8.3.2 Second interview round

For the second interview round, the interview guide was wholly based on the preliminary theoretical framework—that is, the focus was on the particular challenges connected to corporate standardization management and the potentially influential factors included in the framework. However, the questions remained fairly open in order to allow the interviewees to add topics

and factors that were not addressed in the preliminary framework. Again, standardization engineers were interviewed, but also area specialists, and local and higher-level managers. This aimed to access a multiplicity of voices and stakeholders, in order to obtain an overall view. A more detailed account of the list of questions is provided in Appendix I.

During creation of the interview guide, and even more during the process of the actual interviews, concepts and mechanisms such as “interaction between the standardization department and the rest of the organization,” “external standardization committees as a way to collect information and knowledge,”

“external standardization committees as watchdogs,” “processes of knowledge acquisition,” “hazards of knowledge leakage and protection mechanisms,” and

“internal communication flows” emerged as noteworthy points of the study.

Many of those concepts were not part of the preliminary theoretical framework, but sprang from the empirical material. However, the fact that those concepts were not encompassed in the preliminary framework was not a reason to overlook them, but, quite the opposite, was a reason for further exploring them in a subsequent set of interviews.

3.8.3.3 Third interview round

Finally, the first two rounds of interviews in the companies enabled me to produce an even more targeted and refined interview guide for the final round, as I had gathered a number of empirical observations and thus had gained better insights regarding the circumstances and processes of the companies. Hence, the third round, which occurred many months later after an early-stage analysis of the previous material, entailed more targeted questions, departing from earlier empirical insights and including cross-checking of new elements and findings.

Again, a multiplicity of voices was accessed by reaching out to standardization engineers, area specialists, and managers. Some of those respondents had been interviewed in a previous round, while others were new. The rationale for the repetition was to assure the longitudinal nature of the study and cross-check the former and latter responses of the interviewees one year later.

In the latter round, concepts such as “strategic positioning,” “interrelation of internal and external standardization efforts,” “protectionism vs. openness,”

“precedence,” and “organizational awareness” were refined and ultimately encompassed in the revised theoretical framework as insightful findings of this research project. Again, a more detailed account of the list of questions is provided in Appendix I.