Resilience in the face of grand challenges - A longitudinal study on the hospitality industry during COVID-19 pandemic

In the beginning of year 2020, a novel, highly transmissible virus raised alarm in Wuhan, China. From there, the virus quickly spread across the globe, eventually leading to what we will remember as the COVID-19 pandemic. In attempts to contain the spread, governments relied on extreme measures that restricted the movement of individuals and the operations of businesses in an unforeseen way. After over two years, we have seen several waves in the pandemic and been through moments of relief to be faced with increasing adversity again. As a complex, uncertain and global issue, the COVID-19 pandemic and pandemics in general can be considered as part of the world’s grand challenges that urgently needs attention from the management research community. To answer this call, this study draws from the concept of resilience that has been used to explain how organizations overcome adversity, yet has not been connected to and studied with grand challenges. Thus, this study was set out to study empirically how businesses responded to the pandemic and established resilience in the face of adversity. As the hospitality industry was hit hard by the pandemic and the following restrictions, and as SMEs tend to be in general more vulnerable to crisis than large organizations, the empirical focus of the study was on small hospitality businesses. In my longitudinal and inductive study, I inter-viewed six businesses from the hospitality industry in Finland at two different occasions during the year 2020. The analysis revealed that during the pandemic, the businesses were able to quickly react and adapt to changing situations and continue to do so through different phases of the pandemic. Through reorganizing resources and roles, they maintained functioning and generated income. As the situation evolved, the businesses re-adapted their operations accordingly and stayed alert for quick reactions. To achieve resilience, the findings suggest direct and supportive mechanisms. As direct mechanisms, the respondents quickly made sense of the situation, made decisions and implemented actions. They focused on strengthening and developing their existing products and services while staying optimistic and focused on things they can control. To support these actions, strong social connections, previous experiences and the characteristics of the business deemed valuable. These findings suggest that resilience can be achieved through the actions that businesses take during crisis rather than merely through resources and elements achieved beforehand. The findings of this study make an important contribution to both research and the practice of management. Through this study, we can better understand the ways in which SMEs, entrepreneurs and organizations can cope with disturbances and increase their chances of maintaining functioning in such situations. In addition, this study provides new knowledge on what resilience is in practice and how it can be influenced through own actions rather than being determined by attributes. Most importantly, this study adds a small but important contribution into coping with grand challenges