My primary intent is to examine five different approaches to qualitative inquiry narrative, phenomenology, grounded theory, ethnography, and case studies-and to discuss their procedures for conducting a qualitative study. The conduct of a study includes the introduction to a study, including the formation of the purpose and research questions; data collection; data analysis; report writing; and standards of validation and evaluation. In the process of providing procedures for conducting a study, I introduce a comparative analysis of the five approaches so that researchers can make an informed choice as to which approach best suits their research problems.