3.2.2.2 Respondents

To ensure credible responses as well as diversity in the perspectives and perceptions of the respondents, we conducted interviews with highly knowledgeable respondents who held a functional position in the Koinsep social enterprises, i.e. respondents who operated as decision-makers, owners and operators at the time when the interviews were conducted. The respondents that we interviewed reported having a long working experience, mostly outside the organisation (between 10 and 30 years of employment). We also selected respondents from heterogeneous organisational layers who were able to view the examined phenomena from various and diverse perspectives.1 These respondents varied in terms of education and working experience. We interviewed respondents with high educational qualifications (obtained in postgraduate or doctoral programmes) and respondents with a basic educational background (obtained through basic education). We not only selected respondents who hailed from various governance layers, (e.g. (i) appointed or non- appointed members in decision-making bodies of the social enterprises; (ii) respondents who were members of the managing committee; and/or (iii) holders of cooperative shares and members of the general meeting of members) but also stakeholders and employees who were not involved in governance. Finally, we selected respondents who had either a strong or a weak past background with activities related to social entrepreneurship.