Starting-up during COVID-19

The global impact of COVID-19 has rippled into all areas of social, economic, political and business lives no matter what one’s line of work or livelihood. Considerable focus has been directed at understanding some of the challenges presented by the current pandemic on primary research, including the negative impacts of a technology-dependent or technology-mediated field site, the lack of material shared spaces during covid-19 times, interrupted fieldwork, transformed field sites, mental wellbeing, the weakness of online communications in comparison to face-to face contact and other concrete and adverse repercussions of the current pandemic on primary research. While the negative disruptive effects on organizations have been addressed elsewhere (Bartik et al. 2020, Meyer et al. 2020), here I wish to reflect upon my positive experiences of meeting and working with a small start-up. From my home office, I was able to meet and connect to new colleagues, build a research team, and design and conduct a research project at a new field site– all transpiring withouthaving previously worked with the team. These circumstances led me to make decisions that I would not have made sans pandemic but which contributed toward positive project decisions. Feeling encouraged about what we accomplished together without ever having met my research team colleagues in person, I focus on how covid-19 has created new possibilities for connection and for conducting research within and across borders. Rather than to focus on disruption, one might also consider the emergence of new businesses during covid and the ensuing nascent forms and conditions for conducting business at such times.