Abstract
(1) Background: Realist evaluation is a promising approach for evaluating organisational interventions. Crucial to realist evaluation is the development and testing of middle range theories (MRTs). MRTs are programme theories that outline how the intervention mechanisms work in a specific context to bring about certain outcomes. To the best of our knowledge, no organisational intervention study has yet developed initial MRTs. This study aimed to develop initial MRTs based on qualitative evidence from the development phase of an organisational intervention in a large multi-national organisation, the US food service industry. (2) Methods: Data were collected through 20 semi-structured interviews with the organisation′s managers, five focus groups with a total of 30 employees, and five worksite observations. Template analysis was used to analyse data. (3) Results: Four initial MRTs were developed based on four mechanisms of participation, leadership commitment, communication, and tailoring the intervention to fit the organisational context to formulate ‘what may work for whom in which circumstances?’ in organisational interventions; (4) Conclusions: Our findings provide insights into ‘how’ and ‘which’ initial MRTs can be developed in organisational interventions.
Highlights
The organisational intervention literature shows that some organisational interventions have resulted in improvements in psychosocial working conditions and employee health and wellbeing; others have resulted in no effect, and a few even led to a deterioration in psychosocial working conditions and employee health and wellbeing [4,5,6]
Focusing on the above four mechanisms, we developed four initial middle range theories (MRTs) by analysing qualitative data from the development phase of an organisational intervention aiming to improve employees’ health and wellbeing in a large multi-national organisation operating in the US food service industry
Regarding the process of developing initial MRTs, this study addresses the call by Wong et al (2013, 2016) [22,23] to provide details on how realist evaluation has been used in intervention studies
Summary
Organisational interventions are the recommended approach for improving psychosocial working conditions and employees’ health and wellbeing [1,2]. Organisational interventions are ‘planned, behavioural, and theory-based actions that aim to improve employees’. Health and wellbeing by changing the way work is designed, organised, and managed’ [3]. Realist evaluation is a promising approach for evaluating organisational interventions [7]. Realist evaluation seeks to answer the important question of ‘what works for whom in which circumstances?’ through an iterative cycle of developing middle range theories (MRTs) and testing these theories [8]. Despite the emerging application of realist evaluation in organisational intervention studies [10,11,12,13], to the best of our knowledge, no organisational intervention study has developed initial
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