Article by ICG member Kath Rhodes
Something has been bothering me recently. It’s the over-use of ‘qualitative’ in the insight world
Get off my land!
You lot keep saying ‘qualitative’ data when you are
talking about open ends and verbal data.
Words do not qualitative make.
Elaboration in a quantitative survey is great, but it is
not, repeat not, qualitative …
Shoo… Get your own definition to play with…
I think I can see why we’ve had this drift into claiming ‘qualitative’.
We’re living in a data driven world. AI loves data, and it’s good at analysing language, boxing it up
and sorting out what’s been said.
I love this, by the way. AI has delivered really great language analysis tools and really good ways
to find and clip quotes and make compelling films that tell great stories. (Thanks Coloop).
BUT
There is a downside to what’s going on in AI world…
We’re sliding into calling verbal data ‘qualitative’, which makes it easy to offer ‘qualitative at
scale’. And bingo! The world gets more data, faster data and we’ve got both quantitative and
‘qualitative’ on speed dial to businesses.
Of course when we use AI to ask people to ‘say more’ and AI gets more sophisticated in
encouraging people to deliver more verbal data [through chat bots etc] we are going towards
qualitative – we are elaborating, and getting conversational and getting more detail… all of that
can feel qualitative.
But it isn’t. It’s different.
Here’s what I think the difference is.
Good Qualitative Insight:
• Draws on how culture shapes behaviours and attitudes – it knows context matters (and
therefore gives space in its methods and approaches to understand context)
• Looks for deeper understanding – it starts from the position of trying to understand
what’s going on… and works on looking at layered meaning too. So it has longer, deeper
conversations. Interviews happen in the right space and place. It uses observational
tools. It spends time with people. It asks them to spend time exploring…
• Requires reflection and interpretation (of the content, context and production of the
insight). Qualitative researchers mull, think, reflect, talk about, and think strategically
about what this means for our clients…
Qualitative research is necessarily subjective, non-scientific. It doesn’t claim ‘what is’ – it isinstead looking for meaning.
Verbal data enriches the quantitative process, but doesn’t step outside of it, explore it, challenge it, take perspective…
So please, friends and colleagues, don’t call your open ends or verbal data (however much you’ve got) qualitative. AND Stop saying ‘qualitative at scale’.
It’s good stuff, but it’s not my stuff.
Me and my people, we are all about understanding what’s going on.
We deliver our insight thick and rich and with soul… The other stuff – well it’s shallow text.
Please step off and get a new way to talk about what you are offering. And step off now.
Otherwise people are going to start misunderstanding what qualitative is, and what its true
potential is. And then the world will become a flatter, blander place.
Actually that’s what’s bothering me. I wonder if it already is?