Re-Thinking Firm Level Data Collection during COVID-19 : Using Mobile Sensing to Understand the Financial Behaviors of Entrepreneurs
SMEs around the world are entering a crisis period in light of COVID-19, adding new urgency to understanding firm-level financial behaviors and challenges. At the same time, traditional methods of in-person data collection pose a health risk to bot...
| Main Authors: | , , |
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| Format: | Brief |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
World Bank, Washington, DC
2020
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/509061603169522716/Re-Thinking-Firm-Level-Data-Collection-during-COVID-19-Using-Mobile-Sensing-to-Understand-the-Financial-Behaviors-of-Entrepreneurs http://hdl.handle.net/10986/34696 |
| Summary: | SMEs around the world are entering a
crisis period in light of COVID-19, adding new urgency to
understanding firm-level financial behaviors and challenges.
At the same time, traditional methods of in-person data
collection pose a health risk to both enumerator and firm
and contravene social distancing guidelines and public
health policies. Remote data collection methods such as
phone sensing offer a viable and promising alternative.
Phone sensing utilizes data generated from mobile phone
usage, from GPS location to call logs to battery life – to
offer insights on firm behavior, trends, and challenges.
While the technology is still new and untested, this note
explores some of the early insights gained from a pilot of
mobile sensing technology to understand the financial
behavior of women entrepreneurs in Ethiopia. Phone sensing
data allows us to glean some insights into the lives and
behaviors of entrepreneurs which traditional data collection
might not reveal. One of the key finding of this pilot is
that mobile phone sensing data correlates with business
outcomes. Insights such as the ones from this pilot, if
collected at a larger and more systematic scale, could
enhance our understanding of borrower behavior, and could
help lenders and policymakers better target potential
borrowers, better understand when borrowers are likely to
face adversity, and better design products to meet their needs. |
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