About the Book
Clean Language Interviewing is a landmark publication that defines the field for this important practice; it is essential reading for all researchers who seek to obtain data that are faithful to the experience of the interviewee. Clean language interviewing aims to improve the ability of academic and applied researchers to minimise the introduction of the interviewer's own assumptions, to avoid 'leading' questions and instead to ask 'clean' questions.
Heather Cairns-Lee, James Lawley and Paul Tosey present a state-of-the-art review of the principles and practice of clean language interviewing to make this rigorous and innovative method accessible. Using real application examples, a global group of contributors analyse the use of clean language interviewing in multiple settings including business, education, and healthcare.
Table of Contents:
PART 1
Chapter 1. An introduction to clean language interviewing for research; Paul Tosey, Heather Cairns-Lee, and James Lawley
Chapter 2. Eliciting interview data cleanly through minimising leading questions; Heather Cairns-Lee, James Lawley, and Paul Tosey
Chapter 3. Metaphor, clean language and qualitative research; Jan Nehyba
Chapter 4. Enhancing clean language interviewing with modelling; James Lawley
PART 2
Chapter 5. Exploring experiences of work-life balance: a pilot study of clean language as an interview method; Margaret Meyer, Wendy Sullivan, Paul Tosey, and James Lawley
Chapter 6. Drawing lessons learned from mental models of leadership; Heather Cairns-Lee
Chapter 7. The potential of clean language interviewing for journalists; Jacqueline Ann Surin
Chapter 8. Using clean language interviewing to explore the lived experience of neurodifferent job applicants; Nancy Doyle and Uzma Waseem
Chapter 9. Making the unspoken visible through clean language: interviews with families facing encephalopathy in their child; Tania Korsak
Chapter 10. Modelling excellence: using clean language interviewing to research exceptional performance; Lynne Cooper
Chapter 11. Coding-in-the-moment and other hidden skills of clean language interviewing; Caitlin Walker and Marian Way
Chapter 12. Facilitating change in organisations: applying clean language interviewing through action research; Maaike Nooitgedagt and Wendy Nieuwland
Chapter 13. Clean neutrality in conflict; Martin Snoddon
Chapter 14. Clean interviewing in management systems auditing; Yuji Yamagami and James Ramirez
Chapter 15. Adding value and insight: applying clean language interviewing to market research; Wendy Sullivan and Di Tunney
Chapter 16. Interviewing for cause: when interviewing is about life and death; Sharon Small
PART 3
Chapter 17. And, whereabouts is clean language interviewing now?; Paul Tosey, Heather Cairns-Lee, and James Lawley
About the Author :
Heather Cairns-Lee, PhD, is adjunct professor at IMD, Switzerland and a visiting scholar at the University of Surrey, UK. Her teaching and research focus on metaphor, the development of leadership and sensemaking in organisations. Heather’s award-winning PhD study was the first large-scale application of clean language interviewing in a managerial setting.
James Lawley is an independent researcher and a partner at The Developing Company. He has cooperated with and conducted training for several universities and organisations involving the application of clean language, metaphor, and symbolic modelling to qualitative research. James qualified as a psychotherapist in 1993 after a career as a senior manager in large corporations.
Paul Tosey, PhD, is a freelance consultant and researcher. He first undertook training in clean language in 2006 and participates in the field as a coach, author, and research supervisor. Paul’s career experience includes public sector organisation development and university roles, most recently as Senior Lecturer and Head of PhD Programmes in the Surrey Business School, University of Surrey, UK.
Review :
This accessible clearly written edited volume details and explains the principles, methods, and application of clean language interviewing. It offers both a detailed understanding of the method and its applications across a wide range of research settings. Theoretically grounded and practically relevant this book should be essential for all those using interviews in their research and practice.
Being able to conduct interviews as effectively as possible is a vital skill in ‘the interview society’. This accessible and ground-breaking book supports practitioners and academics to minimise their assumptions to produce authentic data from interviewees when it is important to do so.
If you are a qualitative researcher, or curious about how to conduct interviews in a variety of contexts, you will be intrigued by this book. Starting with an introduction to the epistemological foundations of clean language, each chapter examines how clean language principles can help interviewers gain deep insights into individuals’ experiences. Even if you are an experienced interviewer or researcher, you will find yourself returning to this book to learn more about how clean language can help you approach interviews in a qualitatively distinct way.
This book reminds us that the most useful data for a variety of purposes including research, diagnosis or evaluation are, as much as possible, untainted by external categories and schemas. What sociologists call first order perceptions can be accessed through the clean language interviewing approach described here. Interventions or other types of initiatives based on such an approach are more likely to hit the mark since they are informed by valid data and understandings.
Asking good questions is an art which we should never take for granted. This thought-provoking book helps us develop our skills by inviting us to understand the experiences of others in their words, without judgment. A must read for any researcher or practitioner.
When reading my post graduate students’ transcripts of their qualitative research semi-structured interviews, I noticed that they paraphrase the participants’ words into their own. This bothered me and when Prof. Heather Cairns-Lee introduced me to “Clean Language” interviewing, I was delighted. This book comes for me at an opportune time as it offers a solution to the problem I identified in the credibility of our qualitative research. We realise that qualitative research studies rarely found space in our high level journals in Management and Leadership studies, unless, as a colleague of mine described it – the methodology and findings “are glowing in the dark”. I think that this book on “Clean Language” would offer us as qualitative researchers practical guidelines on securing a home for our research output in highly respected journals. As an executive coach, I was struck by the enormous potential of this work on “Clean Language” to augment our coaching mindset on non-directive facilitation of growth of our clients. Prof. Heather Cairns-Lee’s work on metaphors to crystalise leadership identity, using clean language, offers “how to” practical guidelines for executive coaches and I am inspired to use it in my work, and confident that other coaches would find it useful too. Congratulations on the publication of this relevant and rigorous work on “Clean Language”. We are grateful for your contribution to enhance the credibility of our qualitative research and coaching practice.
If you gather information through interviews, put this book on your must-read list. Packed with insights from a collaboration of top experts around the world, this text is a treasure of guidance to improve the competency for cleaning the interview of the interviewer’s assumptions, frames, and worldviews. Thanks to these authors, my clean interviewing competency increased in a range of academic and organization practice interview applications including exemplar modelling, evaluation, recruitment, specification, and phenomenological interviews.
Gathering insight from people and not only data is essential to understanding the business performance. Yet the way that questions are framed is often highly leading, which constrains the ability to gather insight. This book on clean language interviewing describes the principles and practices of asking questions with minimal assumptions that can support business leaders to gain relevant information.
Lots of professionals think they avoid leading questions when wanting to uncover people's actual knowledge, thoughts and feelings. Clean Language Interviewing is a game-changer because it spells out why you might be mistaken about the quality of your questioning, and how you might be unintentionally skewing the information you gather. It demonstrates how to upgrade your approach so that the decisions you make are based on a much stronger foundation. Essential reading for anyone who gathers information through conversations.
Clean Language Interviewing is a learnable skill that can help with truly listening such that people feel heard, and establishing authentic connection. There is no better predictor of outcome in therapy than the relationship between the therapist and client – using Clean Language interviewing can help establish this critical connection. In the world of safety, where incident investigations tend to mimic courtrooms (without the necessary checks and balances), Clean Language can begin to make a real difference – changing the way data is collected. If interviews can be done using Clean Language in an investigation process, we have a game changer – we will learn far more than we ever have about how work is actually done, because we will truly listen and be aware of how our presence as an interviewer can influence the outcome of the interview. I feel this is the way forward – there is a massive move towards authenticity and genuine connection that Clean Language interviewing can support.
Clean Language Interviewing offers a unique, powerful, and insightful method of conducting interviews that keeps your stuff out and gathers their stuff in. This is the most useful and available training for investigatory interviewing I have come across in my career.
I see a growing usefulness of Clean Language Interviewing in the business world, especially as leadership practices evolve for the digital age. We introduced Clean Language into our company two years ago to increase collaboration. Then we saw its benefits in detecting and managing conflicts. Now, we are taking the next step in the use of Clean Language Interviewing: uncovering hidden assumptions. Without bringing out hidden assumptions into the open, we are missing out on "people-data" important to assure project success.
