How to...
Use a repertory grid

The repertory grid – an overview

A big advantage of the repertory grid technique is that it allows interviewees to articulate their experience in the way they see the world, according to their own personal constructs. In so doing, it avoids interviewer bias (the interviewer allowing their questions to be informed by their own values, even subconsciously). Because it also uses differences and similarities with other examples, it can be easier to tease out the interviewee's views than talking in abstract terms. It can also be good for teasing out different dimensions of a question.

For example, suppose a student is asked about their experience of lectures. The interviewer might ask, "What makes a good lecturer?". If the student struggled to respond, the interviewer might mention a couple of prompts, perhaps based on his or her conception of what qualities a good lecturer should possess. With the repertory grid technique, the student and the interviewer could agree on a range of particular lecturers and then use a technique of comparison and contrast as a way of getting the student to talk.

The repertory grid technique, therefore, can be a rich source of qualitative data and allow people to express things in their own terms or jargon. Because it also uses rating scales, it can also be analysed statistically, hence it combines both qualitative and quantitative methodology. In epistemological terms it represents a subjective view of knowledge, in which meaning is to some extent an individual matter.

Kelly's personal construct theory

The repertory grid technique was developed by the clinical psychologist George Kelly, who also developed personal construct theory (PCT). According to PCT, people develop their own rules, or constructs, for interpreting events, situations and people. Such constructs are not abstractions, but are often developed on the basis of previous experience.

For example, in an age of the globalisation of higher education, many students study abroad. Students from some parts of the world can find the Western way of education, which often involves interactive lectures and lecturers getting students to solve problems etc., odd because they expect lecturers just to give them the information. This is not because anyone has actually said to them, "the teacher will tell you everything you need to learn", but rather that that is their experience and so that is the construct which forms their view of education.

In their 2004 article, "A constructivist model for evaluating postgraduate supervision: a case study", published in Quality Assurance in Education, Vol. 12 No. 2, pp. 82-93, Zuber-Skerritt and Roche describe personal construct theory thus:

"Kelly's personal construct theory provided the theoretical framework and overarching methodology for our study. According to the theory, people develop their own tentative models or personal theories about the world in order to understand and negotiate their environments in the roles of 'personal scientists' (Kelly, 1955; 1963). Like scientific theories, personal theories help people to anticipate future events and guide behaviour and attitudes. Theories are tested against experiences and discarded if they fail to provide meaningful interpretations of the world. Personal construct theory assumes that people anticipate and explain events in their world through organisation of perceptions, called 'bi-polar constructs'. People use these bi-polar constructs to test hypotheses, which are the basis of personal theories. Constructs are continually revised, when experience suggests the need for further thought. Kelly's fundamental assumption of 'man the scientist' [sic], thus recognises a dynamic and reflective role for men, presumably also for women, as constructors of knowledge. We are using the term 'personal scientist' (Shaw, 1980).

Kelly developed the repertory grid technique based on his theory to enable structured conversations between researcher and participant and explorations of the individual's world of meaning. Unlike standard approaches to research, such as questionnaires and interviews, the repertory grid can elicit people's constructs without influencing them by the researcher's preconceived questions. In this way the repertory grid is both an ideal tool to explore the uniqueness of the supervision relationship, and a useful benchmarking tool, against which change can be planned and assessed."

The main components of a repertory grid

The main components of the repertory grid are:

• The topic – what the interview is about.
• Elements – these are examples that illustrate the topic. They can be people, objects, experiences, events, according to the topic. The elements can either be chosen by the interviewee, or they can be preselected. In the example about students' views of lecturers given above, the topic would be "What makes a good lecturer?" and the elements would be particular lecturers known to the interviewee. If a number of students were being interviewed, with different backgrounds, the lecturers/elements would not necessarily be the same. To give another example, imagine an exercise designed to elicit views on wine. The topic would be, say, Italian wine, and the elements various wines with the interviewee being asked to taste, and compare them!
• Constructs – the most important component of the repertory grid. This is where the elements are compared with one another to produce a series of statements which describe what the interviewee thinks about the topic. These statements will form the eventual unit of analysis. They will be bipolar – in other words, every statement will be presented as opposite ends of a pole. The students being interviewed about lecturers might say that Lecturer A, as opposed to Lecturers B and C, explains things clearly whereas B and C are hard to follow. So, one set of constructs would be "explains things clearly" as opposed to "hard to follow". The wine interviewees meanwhile might say that Wine A was sweeter than Wines B and C. So, constructs could be "sweet" – "dry", "fruity" – "grassy", "heady" – "light", etc.
• Ratings – once the main constructs and elements are in place, they are entered on a grid with the elements on top and the constructs down the side. The interviewee then rates each element against each construct according to a rating scale, usually of 1-5.

Uses of repertory grid

Because of its ability to capture good data, the repertory grid is used in a wide range of contexts. Below is a non-exhaustive list:

• human resources (for example performance appraisals, job analysis, training needs analysis, staff and organisational development),
• psychology (for example, psychological tests or counselling type interviews),
• brand analysis and consumer behaviour,
• team development and organisational studies,
• information retrieval studies and systems analysis, for example mental modelling.

It is particularly good in circumstances where it is important to understand how people think, for teasing out knowledge which is implicit rather than explicit, and for establishing mental maps. It can be used by both practitioners and researchers.

Advantages and drawbacks of repertory grid

Despite the flexibility of the technique it does have drawbacks:

• It is time-consuming; each interview will take up to an hour.
• It can appear rather artificial, and senior managers in particular may be sceptical about its value, and hence rather unwilling to give time to it.
• There are many variations of design and it can be difficult to select the right one.
• The analysis process can "overwhelm with numbers" and one can become fascinated by the process of computer analysis and what it can "discover" – at the expense of the "bigger picture".

These objections notwithstanding, the technique is commonly used in all sorts of ways and we shall go on to explore this in more detail.

Devi Jankowicz has written a lot about repertory grid technique and in his 2001 article co-written with Penny Dick, "A social constructionist account of police culture and its influence on the representation and progression of female officers: A repertory grid analysis in a UK police force", published in Policing: An International Journal of Police Strategies & Management, Vol. 24 No. 2, pp. 181-199, he makes the following observation:

"There are a number of advantages to using repertory grid. First, it is a method that avoids the use of a priori categories, but since research participants are asked to construe the same phenomena (i.e. effective performance) it is nevertheless systematic enough to allow the identification of shared cognitions. Second, the technique allows participants to articulate their experiences in their own words, yet, due to its systematic nature, enables the researcher to probe participants’ responses such that they are rendered intelligible. Finally, the data obtained from repertory grids is both rich enough to enable a thorough examination of the content of each individual’s construct system, yet sufficiently parsimonious to allow rigorous content analysis that can be checked for reliability. Thus we were able to meet the methodological requirements we have outlined."

Eliciting and designing a repertory grid

One feature of the repertory grid is because much is done in conjunction with the interviewee, the design of the actual grid will be a shared process.

However, you need to consider the overall purpose of the grid, in the light of your research design:

• What is your research question?
• How big will your sample be? (Note that many researchers use a small sample with this technique, as it is fairly time-consuming to carry out.)
• What and how will you analyse?

All these and other questions will need to be considered carefully before you start interviewing. In particular if you are using the grid for a number of interviews (which will be most of the time, a sample of one normally being considered a bit small!) you will need to ensure a certain degree of commonality in the design.

As with other techniques, you do not use the technique in isolation and it is common to use it along with other methods.

Preparation

Before each repertory grid interview it will be important to ensure the following:

• Availability of a quiet room with phones off the hook, so that the interview can take place in a relaxed, uninterrupted atmosphere.
• Availability of a pre-prepared blank grid sheet with the topic in the left-hand corner, space for the elements in the top row and the constructs along the left-hand and right-hand side.
• Explaining to the person concerned the reason for the interview and ensuring that they understand the procedure.
• Agreement about confidentiality.

All interviewing calls for good social skills and the ability to put the interviewee at ease, and repertory grid is no exception.

Agreeing the topic

The extent to which the topic is up for negotiation depends on the situation, but in most research situations it would be chosen by the researcher. It is important that the topic is sufficiently specific, for example, not just leadership but a specific aspect, e.g. leadership and integrity. This will be helped by having a clear research question, as in the following examples.

In their 2007 article, "Articulating appraisal system effectiveness based on managerial cognitions", Wright and Cheung (Personnel Review, Vol. 36 No. 2, pp. 206-230) examine appraisal cognition using the following research questions (RQs):

RQ1. How do practising managers see, interpret and make sense of their performance management experiences? RQ2. In what way can these managerial cognitions of appraisal system experience lead to a deeper understanding of the way forward in designing more effective performance management systems?

In "Destination brand images: a business tourism perspective", Hankinson, G. (2005), Journal of Services Marketing, Vol. 19 No. 1, pp. 24-32, the researcher wanted to find the answer to three research questions connected with destinations for business tourism. The first RQ looked at the key brand image attributes used by events managers to characterise destinations, and a repertory grid was used for this purpose.

Eliciting the elements

The elements chosen must:

• cover the topic of investigation evenly, i.e. be representative,
• be clear, and homogenous – i.e. do not mix people and objects,
• be free from value judgements,
• be familiar to the interviewee,
• be expressed as simply as possible – nouns are easiest, verbs should be active gerunds, e.g. "deciding" rather than "making decisions",
• together, form a set – for example, avoid mixing abstract and concrete nouns, nouns and verbs, etc.,
• be mutually exclusive and not subsets of one another, for example you could not have both "cat" and "siamese".

Elements may be either provided or elicited during the interview. In the previous section the elements in the wine example would be provided, and those for the lecturers example elicited. A common type of element is the personal element, i.e. particular people known to the interviewee. Elements are elicited by providing a general category, and then asking the interviewee to give specific examples.

In the case of provided elements, these may be deduced by looking at the literature, or by some prior research, perhaps through exploratory interviews, or some piloting of the technique.

In "Articulating appraisal system effectiveness based on managerial cognitions", Wright and Cheung came up with nine appraisal systems activities by reading the literature and consulting managers.

In "Using the repertory grid and laddering technique to determine the user's evaluative model of search engines", Journal of Documentation, Vol. 63 No. 2, pp. 259-280, Johnson and Crudge (2007) used search engines as constructs and dyadic elicitation (comparing two search engines) to obtain constructs.

In "Facilities management in medium-sized UK hotels", International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, Vol. 14 No. 2, pp. 72-80, Jones (2002) used a number of elements of facilities management e.g. reception work; general cleaning; catering, etc.

In Hankinson's 2005 article, "Destination brand images: a business tourism perspective", Journal of Services Marketing, Vol. 19 No. 1, pp. 24-32, the researcher used 15 destinations as elements, put into 6 different categories, shown below:

Destinations used as elements in the repertory grids

Destination characteristics	Destination
Commercial	Manchester, Leeds, Bristol
Ports	Southampton, Portsmouth, Liverpool
Seaside resorts	Llandudno, Brighton, Eastbourne
New towns	Warrington, Telford
Historic	Bath, Edinburgh, York
Small, market towns	Guildford

Once the elements are established, they should be set out in some way that enables easy comparison. It is common to set each element down on a card, although the interview can also be done by computer. There should be at least ten elements in order to yield a sufficient number of options.

Sometimes, an "ideal" element is introduced as a way of providing further points of comparison.

• Johnson and Crudge introduced an ideal search engine in the above quoted study.
• In "A constructivist model for evaluating postgraduate supervision: a case study", Zuber-Skerritt and Roche use a number of supervisory roles as elements, including the "ideal supervisor".

Eliciting constructs

Constructs are the data, the unit of analysis, which result from the interview and are generally elicited from the interviewee.

The method used to elicit is to compare and contrast the elements in sets of three, known as triads (or occasionally as two – dyads). Thus the interviewee is shown three elements and then asked to comment on similarities and differences: "In what way are any two of these similar, but different from the third, in terms of [link with the topic]?". The same procedure is then followed with the remaining combinations of elements. Each triad should change at least two of the elements.

The point about using comparisons is to enable opinions and ideas which are often just "below the surface" to become more explicit – in other words, to dig out and make concrete tacit knowledge.

This is the account that Wright and Cheung give of how they carried out their interviews:

"Given these representative appraisal system elements, managers were shown each of the nine appraisal activities in groups of threes called a 'Triad' and asked the Kellyian question: 'In what way are any two of these similar, but different from the third, in terms of how well or how not well they are done in your organization?'

Using E1, E2 and E3 as an example (E1: Attending appraisal training/E2: Attending the annual interview/E3: Reading appraisal guidelines and notes) – a typical response is usually in the form of a construct such as, E1 and E2 are similar because 'I can contribute' and that is why it is done well; whereas E3 is different and not well done because 'I don't get a chance to have my input'. (Hence: I can contribute –- I don't get a chance to have my input). According to Kelly (1955), a construct is always bi-polar in nature and reflects a dimension from which an individual formulates perceptions to make sense of the world. Each appraisal system element was triadically compared twice, using different combinations to elicit as many personal constructs as possible".

In "Improving team performance using repertory grids", Team Performance Management, Vol. 11 Nos. 5/6, pp. 179-187, Boyle (2005) used a repertory grid technique to research soft skills issues in team performance for programmers. The elements were programmers themselves and the comparison process is referred to as follows:

"Of the three elements selected, two elements are compared on some important similarity and the remaining element is compared on some difference between itself and the other two elements. The comparison should be based upon a question that the researcher asks, such as 'In what way are two of these people similar to each other and different from the third?'. The reason for pairing the elements in the triad is then stated. These elements should encourage the respondent to think in contrasts such as 'Liked – Disliked', and 'Personal hero – Villain'" (Fournier, V. (1996), "Cognitive maps in the analysis of personal change during work role transition", British Journal of Management, Vol. 7, pp. 87-105).

The similarities and differences referred to above form the constructs, and they are set out in the left and right hand columns of the grid (similarities on the left and differences on the right).

Qualities of a good construct are well summed up by Jankowicz (2004) as:

• providing clear contrasts
• appropriately detailed
• relevant to the topic.

If the constructs are not sufficiently clear, if they contain cliches or unexplained jargon, then the interviewer needs to probe sensitively to deepen their understanding and arrive at a satisfactory construct. One technique that can be used is "laddering down"; this involves a probing question such as "What sort of thing do you have in mind...?", "Can you give me an example?", asking them to explain as if to a Martian, what such a person does, etc.

Johnson and Crudge (2007) describe the laddering process, as well as Kelly's belief that some constructs are core to a person's belief system, as follows:

"Kelly believed that construct systems are hierarchically organised and interrelated by cause and effect, with some constructs being central to the beliefs of an individual. These core concepts can be visualised as forming the topmost points of a pyramid, with the lower positions filled by the system of interrelated constructs. During laddering, the interviewer starts at any point within this system, termed the 'seed item', and using a series of probing questions the participant is guided up, down and across the (hierarchical) construct system (Rugg et al., 1999). This method is essentially a combination of Hinkle's (1965) laddering technique used to move upwards within the hierarchy, with Landfield's (1971) pyramid technique used to move downwards in the hierarchy. It has now become standard for the term 'laddering' to refer to the combined method" (Johnson and Crudge, "Using the repertory grid and laddering technique to determine the user's evaluative model of search engines", Journal of Documentation, Vol. 63 No. 2, pp. 259-280).

Johnson and Crudge also describe how they used a technique of laddering up and down, taking the probe "why is that important to you?" to move the participants higher up their pyramids, and "how is it different?" to move lower. An example of a probe statement is shown below:

Rating systems

The rating scale needs to be decided in advance; a 5-point scale is common. It is inadvisable to go beyond 7 points as the distinctions would be too fine. Kelly himself used a 2-point scale, which was just the construct and its opposite mainly in order to focus on meaning rather than numbers.

Wright and Cheung describe their rating system as follows:

"Once the constructs were elicited, the manager was then asked to rate each of the nine appraisal activities using a 5-point scale based on their own generated bi-polar constructs (used as semantic differentials); A rating of '1' represented elements that were closest to the left-hand side of the bi-polar construct elicited; and a rating of '5' represented elements that were best explained by the bi-polar construct pole on the right of the grid. After all of the elements were rated, the respondents were asked to choose the side of the bi-polar constructs that, in their view, represents a key attribute of an effective appraisal system ... Upon the completion of this exercise, all grid respondents' constructs and ratings were aggregated (Bougon, 1992) to generate one aggregate repertory grid ... The data was then inputted into the RepGrid programme to generate a principal component analysis, collective cognitive maps, and cluster analysis for discussion".

Analysing a repertory grid

The power and attraction of the repertory grid technique is that it can be analysed in so many different ways. Skilled interviewing can yield a wealth of qualitative data which reveals the interviewee's thoughts and beliefs. For those who prefer the greater certainty of numbers, the ratings will give plenty of opportunity for statistical analysis.

Any analysis is a matter of going from first impressions down to ever deeper levels. The first stage should therefore be to gain an overall impression, through a descriptive analysis. After that, the fun with the numbers can start. However, for most research projects, a number of repertory grid interviews will be carried out, so it is important to have a strategy for analysing multiple grids. We shall consider these topics in turn.

For information on software packages, please see section 4 – Some examples, and further sources of information.

Basic descriptions

Having obtained a grid, make some quick notes on general observations you made on the interview – e.g. how did it go?/did the subject find it easy to talk? – as well as on the actual grid. Here are a few techniques for overall observation:

• Process analysis: what was actually going on during the interview, as opposed to the constructs captured on the grid? How did the interviewee react to the topic? The elements? If the latter were elicited, what can you tell from the interviewee's choice? What were the constructs like? How easy was the rating process?
• Eyeball analysis: this is where you turn from the process to looking at the grid itself, in order to form an overall impression. What strikes you about the elements and constructs? Is there anything obvious with the ratings?
• Construct characterisation: do a quick overall summary of the constructs. How many are what is termed core, i.e. of great significance to the interviewee, as opposed to being of peripheral or marginal significance? Is there any particular type of construct that dominates, any theme running through? How are the constructs related?

Remember: first impressions count!

Analysing relationships within a single grid

Some relationships between elements or constructs may be apparent at a glance, others you may need to dig a little deeper for.

Comparing relationships between constructs and elements

If you do not have access to a statistical software package, or if you want to reflect on these relationships with your interviewee, you can do a low level number crunching exercise looking at relationships between elements and constructs. This is just a matter of:

• For elements, summing the difference between each element pair across all the constructs, and comparing the sums to see where there is the greatest similarity or difference.
• For constructs, conducting a similar exercise for a similar effect across all construct pairs across all elements.

Cluster analysis

This technique is one which you need a software package for, and it helps you to highlight the relationships in a grid and see them in diagrammatic form. It works out the similarity scores as described above, and then reorders the columns and rows so that the ones that are most similar are closest together. The picture is then shown in the form of a dendrogram, which portrays the relationships in the form of branches on a tree. You will then be able to see close similarities between different constructs and elements from where "clusters" of branches occur.

Principle component analysis

This is another technique requiring a software package, which also shows in diagrammatic form the similarities and differences between elements and constructs. It works by isolating the components where there is the greatest variant, and plotting them on a graph with the first component as the horizontal line (x-axis) and the second component as the vertical line (y-axis). The constructs and elements are then plotted against the two component lines, or x-axis and y-axis, and their relative distance against the latter shows the extent to which the components represent them.

In "Improving team performance using repertory grids", Boyle provides a useful summary of the differences between these two techniques.

Analysing multiple grids

The nature of research being as it is, it is highly likely that you will be using not one, but a number of repertory grid interviews. In order to do this, it is important that you design the research so that the interviews have stable components: either the elements or the constructs should be the same. As the constructs are more commonly elicited, this will more often be the elements.

In "Articulating appraisal system effectiveness based on managerial cognitions", Wright and Cheung discuss the importance of keeping either the elements or the constructs constant in situations where you are trying to obtain comparisons, and refer to the literature.

If there is no constant component, it is still possible to obtain meaningful comparison providing the number of constructs is constant over the different interviews. The reason for this is to ensure that there is no variation in the sum of differences.

Content analysis

This is a common method for analysing qualitative data, using words rather than figures, and has been covered elsewhere on this site. (See "How to... analyse qualitative data".

One of the main decisions to make with content analysis is what is the unit of analysis; with repertory grid technique, it is always the construct. The procedure is then much the same as with any content analysis:

• Determine the categories to be used. These may be drawn from the literature, or they may be compiled on the hoof, from the constructs themselves, by comparing these and putting each new theme into a new category.
• Tabulate the categories and the constructs.
• Summarise the table: reflect on the meaning of the categories, find examples of each, and reflect on the frequency with which they occur.

If part of the research is to consider the difference between particular sub-groups, for example according to gender, then it's important when collecting the data to have some sort of code to indicate these sub-groups, so that when you are carrying out the analysis you can create different columns to show them.

It is also important to establish reliability: one way of doing this is by getting someone else to replicate your analysis and see if you come up with the same categories. Another way is to have two researchers working independently.

The problem with the method outlined above is that it just uses verbal components, i.e. the constructs and the elements, whilst ignoring ratings. If you want also to be able to use the ratings, follow the technique suggested by Peter Honey in "The repertory grid in action", Industrial and Commercial Training, 1979, Vol. 11 Nos. 9-11, pp. 452-459. Part of his method is to ascribe an overall summary construct for each interviewee.

In the 2004 article, "Leading with integrity: a qualitative research study", Journal of Health Organization and Management, Vol. 18 No. 6, pp. 415-434, Storr describes how in a study of the relationship between leadership and integrity, she applied the repertory grid technique to managers in the UK's National Health Service. She interviewed managers from three levels – executive and non-executive, senior manager and supervisor. In analysing her findings she was able to draw conclusions which related to the management level.

In "Improving team performance using repertory grids", Boyle uses a range of techniques to analyse the constructs obtained from the interview.

In Hankinson (2005), "Destination brand images: a business tourism perspective", Journal of Services Marketing, Vol. 19 No. 1, pp. 24-32, the constructs are set out in clusters with frequencies.

Some examples, and further sources of information

This section includes reference to some Emerald articles which contain useful descriptions of the repertory grid technique. The articles may have already been used as illustrations in the rest of this guide, but are included here as a way of helping the reader build up a body of literature on the subject.

Emerald articles

The following is a list of some Emerald articles:

About the technique itself

Boyle, T.A. (2005), "Improving team performance using repertory grids", Team Performance Management, Vol. 11 Nos. 5/6, pp. 179-187.
Describes use of the technique to look at team performance, and also includes some helpful general discussion of the methodology.

Jankowicz, D. (2001), "Why does subjectivity make us nervous?: Making the tacit explicit", Journal of Intellectual Capital, Vol. 2 No. 1, pp. 61-73.
This article explores use of the technique, and what makes it effective.

Marsden, D. and Littler, D. (2000), "Repertory grid technique – An interpretive research framework", European Journal of Marketing, Vol. 34 No. 7, pp. 816-834.
This is an important article which looks at the use of the technique within the framework of qualitative research.

Easterby-Smith, M., Thorpe, R. and Holman, D. (1996), "Using repertory grids in management", Journal of European Industrial Training, Vol. 20 No. 2, pp. 3-30.
Easterby-Smith has written extensively about the technique and this article, although a little old, is a good introduction and looks at some of the management applications.

Technique applications

Leadership studies:

Senior, B. (1996), "Team performance: using repertory grid technique to gain a view from the inside", Journal of Managerial Psychology, Vol. 11 No. 3, pp. 2-32.
Looks at the technique as applied to team performance.

Storr, L. (2004), "Leading with integrity: a qualitative research study", Journal of Health Organization and Management, Vol. 18 No. 6, pp. 415-434.
Uses repertory grid to look at the idea of integrity in leadership.

HR and organizational issues:

Dick, P. and Jankowicz, P. (2001), "A social constructionist account of police culture and its influence on the representation and progression of female officers: A repertory grid analysis in a UK police force", Policing: An International Journal of Police Strategies & Management, Vol. 24 No. 2, pp. 181-199.

Harris, H. (2001), "Researching discrimination in selection for international management assignments: the role of repertory grid technique", Women in Management Review, Vol. 16 No. 3, pp. 11-126.

Wright, R.P. and Cheung, F.K. (2007), "Articulating appraisal system effectiveness based on managerial cognitions", Personnel Review, Vol. 36 No. 2, pp. 206-230.

Zuber-Skerritt, O. and Roche, V. (2004), "A constructivist model for evaluating postgraduate supervision: a case study", Quality Assurance in Education, Vol. 12 No. 2, pp. 82-93.
A good example of a higher education application.

Marketing, consumer studies, branding:

Caldwell, N. and Coshall, J. (2002), "Measuring brand associations for museums and galleries using repertory grid analysis", Management Decision, Vol. 40 No. 4, pp. 383-392.

Hankinson, G. (2005), "Destination brand images: a business tourism perspective", Journal of Services Marketing, Vol. 19 No. 1, pp. 24-32.

Rocchi, B. and Stefani, G. (2006), "Consumers’ perception of wine packaging: a case study", International Journal of Wine Marketing, Vol. 18 No. 1, pp. 33-4.

Logistics:

Lemke, F. (2003), "Investigating the meaning of supplier-manufacturer partnerships: An exploratory study", International Journal of Physical Distribution & Logistics Management, Vol. 33 No. 1, pp. 12-35.

Facilities management:

Jones, C. (2002), "Facilities management in medium-sized UK hotels", International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, Vol. 14 No. 2, pp. 72-8.

Information systems:

Crudge, S.E. and Johnson, F.C. (2007), "Using the repertory grid and laddering technique to determine the user's evaluative model of search engines", Journal of Documentation, Vol. 63 No. 2, pp. 259-280.

Textbooks

A particularly useful book, and one that is both easy and fun to read, is:

Jankowicz, D. (2004), The Easy Guide to Repertory Grids, John Wiley & Sons Ltd, Chichester, UK.

Software

Useful sites for repertory grid software can be found at:

WebGrid III – http://tiger.cpsc.ucalgary.ca/

http://repgrid.com/ – a site that looks at computer applications of personal construct theory.