CITATION AND COPYRIGHT INFORMATION:
Cite as: Dervin, B. (1991/2001). An example of a Sense-Making designed focus group: Design for focus groups for phone user constituencies. Unpublished report.
© Brenda Dervin (1991 & 2001).

ABSTRACT:
This focus group guide was developed in 1991 for a telecommunication company and was applied through a series of workshops attended by a variety of constituent groups relevant to the company’s plans. It is based on the Sense-Making Methodology as defined in 1991. The design presented here is still in 2002 reasonably typical of Sense-Making designed focus groups. There have recent advances in the theory that informs Sense-Making interviewing that are incorporated. For these, readers should see: http://communication.sbs.ohio-state.edu/sense-making/.

This project incorporates as a primary activity the conducting of a series of regional one-day conferences. These one-day conferences will be held in different locales and involve different constituencies. The workshop day will consist of presentations, demonstrations, and round-table discussions. The round-table discussions are to form the bulk of the day’s activities.

The purpose of the round-table discussions is to focus on identifying the most pressing needs for the constituency groups represented and on exploring ways in which telecommunications can be applied to meet these needs. The fundamental purpose of these round-table discussions, then, is to hear what the constituency participants have to say.

From the start, it is taken as a given that there will be many variations across conferences—different constituencies, different local interests, different facilitators, different constituency concerns. In addition, there are a great many unknowns. If we already knew what constituencies have to say there would be no need for the workshops.

Fundamentally, what is offered in this guide is a manual for holding a series of focus groups, in order to assess the needs, visions, experiences and ideas of different constituencies. Given this purpose, this guide has been designed with two major goals in mind:

1. To assure that when round-table discussions take place the constituency representatives will freely express their thoughts. We want to hear what constituents really think—not what they think we want them to think.
2. To allow maximum flexibility in conducting the round-table discussions so that a particular facilitator in a particular location with a mandate to hear the thoughts of a particular constituency, or set of constituencies can adapt and arrive at a plan maximally suitable to the particular situation.

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