Understanding crisis resilience in manufacturing firms in the DACH region during the COVID-19 pandemic

PurposeThis paper describes the impact of COVID-19 on manufacturing firms in the DACH region of Europe (DACH is an acronym used to describe Germany, Austria and Switzerland). The purpose of the study was threefold: first to describe crisis resilience empirically through the actions taken by the firms using the elements of resilience; the paper then goes on to compare the DACH region with Northern Italy; finally, based on the findings, an existing crisis management model is expanded.Design/methodology/approachA mixed method of quantitative research based on survey data and qualitative interviews was applied for data collection. The findings are based on 57 survey results and 13 interviews from December 2020 to March 2021. The findings are presented based on the resilience elements and are discussed based on processes, technologies and people. The findings are compared with those from an Italian study made 6–9 months before this study. The comparison provides the basis for the adaptations to the crisis management model.FindingsThe findings describe the actions taken by firms in the DACH region to overcome the challenges posed by COVID-19. The findings were, in most cases, very similar to those from the Italian study. The most resilient firms had well-defined processes in place, adaptable employees who were well-led, and had (digital) technologies that could be quickly implemented.Originality/valueThe timing for the crisis was later in the DACH region and firms were able to learn from Italy. The crisis management model based on the Italian study was refined; the resulting model will support managers to face future crises. This model needs testing and extending to link to past and future events.

The contribution of business continuity management (BCM) to supply chain resilience: a qualitative study on the response to COVID-19 outbreak

PurposeThis paper investigates the relationships between the core elements of a BCM system and SCRES constituents, i.e. visibility, agility, flexibility, velocity and collaboration. An explorative multiple case studies methodology was adopted, consisting of organizations in the retail, manufacturing and humanitarian sectors that had to withstand the impact of the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic (January to June 2020).Design/methodology/approachThe paper adopts an interpretative approach to understand organizational behavior through observations. The source of data comes from in-depth interviews as well as the scrutiny of available official documents for triangulation. The unit of analysis is the organizations internal supply chain with a specific focus on their BCM system and SCM arrangements.FindingsThis paper shows how core BCM practices have a direct impact on supply chain resilience constituents. Specifically practices such as establishing a crisis management committee and risk assessments boost constituents such as agility and flexibility. This advances the theoretical discussion on supply chain resilience, while providing practical examples for organizations to build a response to pandemic incidents.Originality/valueThis paper validates the contribution of business continuity management to supply chain resilience, a concept that has mainly been linked to practices such as risk management. In this regard, this paper enriches the discussion. Secondly, the analysis explains how specific BCM practices worked during the first wave of the pandemic and how they were implemented, providing a clear path for supply chain resilience.

Keeping key suppliers alive during the COVID-19 pandemic: artificial supply chain resilience and supplier crisis response strategies

PurposeThe study investigates supply chain leaders’ initiatives to support their partners in the early stages of the coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, identifying measures taken to increase supply chain resilience and their impact on the quality of supply chain relationships.Design/methodology/approachTwo complementary phases are employed. First, an exploratory approach is adopted, with the method of discourse analysis being employed in the identification of the supplier crisis response strategies by S&P500’s top 30 firms. Second, two scenario-based experiments with 983 participants evaluated the impact of such strategies in two dimensions of supply chain relationships’ quality (supplier satisfaction and supplier commitment).FindingsPhase one revealed five initiatives’ groups adopted: safety measures, innovative tools, information and knowledge sharing, supply chain finance and supply chain continuity. Phase two results indicate that supplier crisis response strategies have positive effects on both supplier satisfaction and commitment. Data also suggest that safety measures, innovative tools, and information and knowledge sharing strategies negatively impacted supplier satisfaction and commitment, when compared with strategies adopted by other buying firms competing for the same supplier. Supply chain continuity was negatively associated with both dimensions when other buying firms implemented innovative tools and information and knowledge sharing strategies with their suppliers, while supply chain finance yielded in no differences in comparison to strategies adopted by competing buying firms.Originality/valueThe authors offer a theoretical typology for supply chain resilience (i.e. natural and artificial), providing support for buying firms’ decisions regarding supplier crisis response strategies through the strengthening of artificial supply chain resilience to increase the likelihood of vulnerable key suppliers’ survival.

Towards enhancing creativity in university settings: does hope of academic knowledge workers matter?

PurposeAlthough a burgeoning body of literature has established the influence of hope and employee creativity, the debate on the relative importance of hope and its components of pathway and agency on its outcomes has not been clarified. Literature has it that hope and its individual components of pathway and agency have a varying magnitude of influence on its outcomes. Some scholars argue that agency and pathway components better predict its outcomes than overall hope. The current study establishes the relative importance of hope and its components on creativity using evidence from Makerere University, Uganda.Design/methodology/approachThe study adopted a cross-sectional quantitative survey design to collect data from the academic staff of Makerere University. The study used usefulness analysis to establish the relative importance of the predictor variables on the dependent variable.FindingsThe study findings revealed that agency and hope components of hope significantly predicted creativity. Overall, hope also significantly predicted creativity. Regarding relative importance, hope turned out to be the most “useful” predictor of creativity, followed by its components of agency and pathway.Research limitations/implicationsThe study was conducted in a public university setting located in urban areas. The findings may not be generalizable to private settings due to variations in the teacher's creative behaviour with variation in the creative environment. The study was also cross-sectional, which may not yield results of changing employee creativity over time. Further studies should establish the link between hope and creativity using a longitudinal survey to compare employee creativity using data collected at different intervals.Originality/valueThe value of the current study is both theoretical and empirical. Theoretically, the study findings enrich the hope theory by revealing the relative importance of hope on its outcomes over and above its components. The study also confirms the assertions of the dual pathway to creativity model by revealing that employees who are rich in hope components of agency and pathway have the cognitive flexibility to pursue creative goals and, when faced with failure, can generate alternative solutions to solve work problems.

A systematic literature review of community disaster resilience: main and related research areas and agendas

PurposeThis study aims to characterize the main research areas of published works, identify the disciplines that associated with the works and propose research agendas for future inquiries, based on a systematic literature review that encompasses 89 research papers from 2010 to 2020.Design/methodology/approachThis review commenced with the definition of the three research questions, and subsequently three steps were followed: (1) defining criteria for research paper selection; (2) specifying the data bases and selecting the papers based on the criteria and (3) data analysis, conclusion and discussion of selected papers. The search was limited to the selection of research papers in English, focusing on “community disaster resilience” which is the subject of this review and referred to as keywords which were used for the online search for papers. All these three words must be present in the title of the selected papers.FindingsThe area “resilience management” and “disaster resilience assessment” accounted for 43% of the studies, and it indicates that research has emphasized the description of how community disaster resilience has been managed and assessed. Three disciplines relating to disaster resilience are disaster risk science, public health and environment, and it indicates that research has fostered core areas of community disaster resilience. Three key research agenda include a growing trend to describe successful efforts to avert a potentially catastrophic disaster through solution-based case studies; a paradigmatic shift and implementation of how communities could help the disaster victims recuperate from disasters.Research limitations/implicationsThis review is limited to the numbers of chosen papers, as only full papers were chosen. However, in order to establish more rigorous and inclusive results of the study, the numbers of citations of published papers to be chosen for future inquiry should be taken into account.Originality/valueThis present review originally investigated how the concept of disaster resilience has been applied at the community level and in related areas. As resilience is a multidisciplinary concept that has been investigated by several different disciplines, such as sustainability, psychology, economy and sociology, this study looked into how disciplines related to community disaster resilience to provide agenda for future inquiries. This study therefore characterized the main research areas of published works, identified the disciplines that associated with the works and proposed a research agenda for future inquiries.

Community resilience for urban flood-prone areas: a methods paper on criteria selection using the Fuzzy Delphi method

PurposeCommunity resilience decides a lot on a city's ability to withstand an external shock. It has evolved naturally from a bounce-back approach to a more robust and meaningful bounce-forward process. The study explores gaps found in community resilience and finds that criteria specific to different disasters are absent.Design/methodology/approachThe study uses a multi-criteria decision analysis technique, fuzzy Delphi, to select criteria. Derivation of the initial list of criteria was from a pilot study, a focus group discussion and other literature studies which was followed by the fuzzy Delphi survey.FindingsAfter two rounds of fuzzy Delphi analysis, the consensus among 65 experts resulted in selecting 125 sub-sub-criteria within seven criteria. Findings show that many criteria previously not discussed in other pieces of literature project high fuzzy scores such as “availability of drinking water post-disaster” and “cracking down fake news spreaders by the police”. In addition, positive cooperation between political and religious institutions have proven to expedite disaster recovery.Research limitations/implicationsThe future scope also includes weighing the selected criteria using analytical hierarchy process (AHP).Practical implicationsPolicymakers in the disaster management domain can use the study findings in implementing effective disaster mitigation strategies.Originality/valueThe selection of criteria is based on the community resilience shown by the Kerala community during the floods of 2018 and 2019 (in Kerala). Measures demonstrated by the community need to be studied, which will help foster disaster mitigation better in future scenarios.

Impact of COVID-19 pandemic on community lifelines

PurposeThe authors present the impact of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic on community lifelines. The state machinery has several departments to secure essential lifelines during disasters and epidemics. Many countries have formed national disaster management authorities to deal with manmade and natural disasters. Typical lifelines include food, water, safety and security, continuity of services, medicines and healthcare equipment, gas, oil and electricity supplies, telecommunication services, transportation means and education system. Supply chain systems are often affected by disasters, which should have alternative sources and routes. Doctors, nurses and medics are front-line soldiers against diseases during pandemics.Design/methodology/approachThe COVID-19 pandemic has revealed how much we all are connected yet unprepared for natural disasters. Political leaders prioritize infrastructures, education but overlook the health sector. During the recent pandemic, developed countries faced more mortalities, fatalities and casualties than developing countries. This work surveys the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on health, energy, environment, industry, education and food supply lines.FindingsThe COVID-19 pandemic caused 7% reductions in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions during global lockdowns. In addition, COVID-19 has affected social fabric, behaviors, cultures and official routines. Around 2.84 bn doses have been administrated, with approximately 806 m people (10.3% of the world population) are fully vaccinated around the world to date. Most developed vaccines are being evaluated for new variants like alpha, beta, gamma, epsilons and delta first detected in the UK, South Africa, Brazil, USA and India. The COVID-19 pandemic has affected all sectors in society, yet this paper critically reviews the impact of COVID-19 on health and energy lifelines.Practical implicationsThis paper critically reviews the health and energy lifelines during pandemic COVID-19 and explains how these essential services were interrupted.Originality/valueThis paper critically reviews the health and energy lifelines during pandemic COVID-19 and explains how these essential services were interrupted.

Supply chain resilience in the face of uncertainty: how horizontal and vertical collaboration can help?

PurposeThe COVID-19 outbreak highlights that many supply chains are exposed to unforeseen disruptions, that risks are unavoidable, and that the international nature of supply chains can seriously disrupt normal operations. Therefore, the need for Supply Chain Resilience (SCRES) is more imperative than ever. Furthermore, collaboration in supply chains may have benefitted the response to the COVID-19 outbreak. The aim of this research is to gain a deeper understanding of how collaboration with both types of horizontal and vertical collaboration in the supply chain affects its resilience.Design/methodology/approachA thematic analysis of the literature is used to investigate the concepts of both vertical and horizontal collaboration and supply chain resilience separately, then integrating identified themes to understand the relationship between them through a thematic map.FindingsThe thematic analysis indicates that the more firms collaborate in the supply chain, the more resilient they will be. Furthermore, both horizontal and vertical collaboration between supply chain partners will enhance resilience. This relationship is positively moderated by governance in the partnership and negatively moderated by competition in the partnership.Originality/valueThis is one of the first papers to provide in-depth insights into how collaboration, with both types of horizontal and vertical collaboration, affects supply chain resilience. Neither of previous articles provide an understanding of how both types of collaboration enables supply chain resilience.

Resource mobilization and contributing resources to a collective task by emergency responders: an experimental study on collaboration in crisis response

PurposeTwenty-first century crises reaffirm the need of faster mobilization of resources during crises. Without interorganizational collaboration and resource mobilization, organizing efficient response is not possible. Resource mobilization is an essential aspect of response. It ensures a faster and better response. Collaboration between teams of emergency responders may include commonly known boundary spanning activities such as resource sharing, information sharing and communication. The purpose of this paper is to contribute our knowledge of how to organize a better crisis response through collaboration. More precisely, what strategies work as drivers for emergency responder teams during collaboration in crisis scenarios.Design/methodology/approachThrough design of experiments, using tabletop exercises and online surveys, this study investigates the drivers of collaboration during a crisis scenario. Participants of this study are decision makers and emergency responders from various public actors in crisis management from Sweden.FindingsCollaboration is essential to manage cross-functional services in normal times, as well as meet the growing needs during crises. In absence of collaboration, boundary spanning activities such as sharing resources or information to provide any kind of service will not be possible. For teams to survive in fast-changing environment, they must be able to adapt to the changing demands accordingly. This paper demonstrates which factors are drivers for emergency responders to mobilize resources, especially during crises. It captures the tension between individual and collective goals in crisis response and highlights the drivers that affect decision-making during crises.Originality/valueThe novelty of the paper lies in its methodology using tabletop exercises, design of experiments as part of Six Sigma toolbox and online surveys in combination with weightage of agreements and disagreements and free text answers. Although scientific research so far has demonstrated the need for collaboration during crises, however, which factors act as drivers for emergency responders to collaborate, is lacking scientific evidence. Incentives for collaboration have not been studied enough. These can tell us which strategies can improve collaboration during crises. This research paper is a scientific contribution in that direction.