Abstract
Prior research showed that systemic shocks can be a catalyst for change and innovation: coping with a systemic adversity can lead actors to reflect on the obsolescence of internal practices and mobilize resources and capabilities. However, experiencing a shock is not per se a condition which enables innovation in organizations: many organizations fail to maintain innovations and forget positive routines and practices developed in the most difficult moments. The need to forget the negative emotions associated to the traumatic event may prevail over the capacity to retain newly acquired knowledge. Moreover, as major shocks impact on multiple aspects of life for a prolonged period of time, everyday hassles (i.e., minor stressors and tensions that individuals experience due to their work, family, or personal situations) are amplified and consequently post-shock learning can be hampered. As the PNRR suggests “research and actions focused on the specific ability of people to respond to events that impact well-being psychosocial and quality of life” are needed. Our research goal is to improve current understanding of how organizations learn and maintain innovative routines and practices after the experience of a systemic shock. We will develop a multi-method and multi-level analysis. By combining both key subjects’ qualitative interviews and quantitative field surveys, we will explore how systemic shocks and daily hassles interact and affect individuals’ emotional states and learning capabilities, and how individual and team resilience processes may favor learning and the maintenance of innovative organizational practices in the post-shock period. Our theoretical framework combines prior framework on knowledge creation with a structural perspective on organizational learning. According to the former the knowledge creation process involves a dynamic interaction between tacit and explicit knowledge (named knowledge creation spiral) and includes four different modes of conversion (i.e., socialization, externalization, combination, and internalization), while the latter focuses on institutionalized structural and procedural arrangements that allow organizations to systematically collect, analyze, store, disseminate, and use information that is relevant to organizational performance (Popper & Lipshitz, 1998). Our sampling strategy is to focus on firms operating in industries which experienced a radical redesign of their business model to cope with the post-pandemic economic scenario (i.e., healthcare, consulting, and creative industries). A cross-industry analysis will allow us having sufficient variability to compare individuals and teams that experience distinctive hassles due to the variability of organizational responses to the major shock. In addition, multi-level longitudinal survey data will be useful to analyze how changes in the way individuals, teams and organizations interpret and react to shocks and inform learning and resilience in time.
Project details
Unibo Team Leader: Marcello Russo
Unibo involved Department/s:
Dipartimento di Scienze Aziendali
Coordinator:
ALMA MATER STUDIORUM - Università di Bologna(Italy)
Total Eu Contribution: Euro (EUR) 209.988,00
Total Unibo Contribution: Euro (EUR) 87.000,00
Project Duration in months: 24
Start Date:
28/09/2023
End Date:
31/12/2025
