Not Now: Negotiating Research Access during Phases of Crisis

Abstract

The conduct of qualitative research often rests on a fundamental condition: the establishment of research access. Gaining quality research access is a challenge even at the best of times due to the intimacy and timescale of data collection. This challenge becomes even more severe in situations of crises, such as the Covid-19 pandemic, when actors are concerned with maneuvering organizations through tough times. Despite its centrality for the conduct of qualitative research, there is a lack of methodological studies on the establishment of access in management and organization research. Therefore, this article contributes to the methods literature in management and organization research by investigating the enabling conditions of research access in crisis situations. We draw on a comparative case analysis of eight instances of access negotiations conducted during the Covid-19 pandemic. We show how interpersonal trust and perceived value of the research project mitigate the constraining effects of Covid-19, and we also reveal the underlying mechanisms through which trust and perceived value are established. Our findings are of relevance to all researchers seeking research access for qualitative research projects.

Etnografia organizacional em um mundo permeado pela tecnologia digital

“…Entre os fatores que podem dificultar o acesso ao campo estão questões políticas (Cunliffe & Alcadiapani, 2016;Aroles, 2020), expectativas não acadêmicas no caso de um pesquisador insider (Brannick & Coghlan, 2007), a demanda pelo aprendizado prévio do pesquisador sobre aspectos relacionados ao campo (Alexander & Smith, 2018), ou o advento de um momento de crise, como a crise sanitária vivida durante a pandemia da Covid-19 (Friesl, Hanel, & Konuk, 2022). Assim, o pesquisador deve contatar todas as pessoas possíveis de serem bons intermediários entre seu projeto de pesquisa e o campo, ser persistente, e garantir que o projeto seja apresentado de uma forma que desperte o interesse da organização ou de alguém que decida (Feldman, Bell, & Berger, 2004).…”

The Digital Transformation of Incumbent Firms

“…Another key challenge of conducting qualitative research is research access (Friesl, Hanel, & Konuk, 2022). Qualitative research often requires a plethora of different cases and data sources.…”

Strategic Change as a Process of Meaning Making : Empirical Studies on Sensemaking, Role Identity, and Accountability Enactment in Situations of Strategic Change

“…To do so, qualitative researchers engage in in-depth analyses, which are often conducted over long periods of time (van de Ven & Huber, 1990), in close collaboration with actors in the field (Cunliffe & Alcadipani, 2016), and require intimate access to partly high confidential information (Friesl et al, 2022). Thus, the selection of a theoretically significant research context is a necessary prerequisite to qualitative research .…”

“…First, focussing on organisational actors' sensemaking of changing environments, the Covid-19 pandemic was a major influence thereof. Representing an extreme context, which is the presence of events that impose existential threats to organisations (Hannah et al, 2009) phases of crisis (Friesl et al, 2022). Drawing on a comparative case analysis of eight instances of access negotiations conducted during the pandemic, we show how interpersonal trust and the perceived value of the research project mitigate the constraining effects of the crisis.…”

“…Within the realm of qualitative research, there are a variety of data sources that can be drawn upon. Depending on the research objective and the negotiated degree of research access, qualitative researchers can build on interviews, documents, ethnographic data, and alike (Friesl et al, 2022). The three empirical papers of this dissertation are largely based on interview data.…”