Insider as Action Researcher

Abstract

Usually, the action researcher is someone who is external to the organization, provides expertise in an organizational intervention, and systematically evaluates the intervention to gain knowledge from the action. The responsibility for the research role by researcher and practitioner within action research can vary along a continuum from where the researcher takes full responsibility for research-oriented tasks to where the researcher coaches the practitioner in fulfilling research-oriented tasks. This chapter explores the end of the continuum where the inside practitioner is provided with the theory and research structure to fulfill more of the research-oriented tasks. The ill-structured problem domain of business planning is used to illustrate. Executives, who are students within an Executive MBA Program and are also participants in organizational interventions, fulfill the role of insider-as-researcher. Results indicate that insider action researchers can provide sensitive data to which outsider action researchers may not have access and are capable of systematically evaluating organizational interventions.