Conceptualizing the who, what, when, where, why and how of resilience in organizations

The study of resilience in organizations has progressed significantly in the past few decades, yet the field still faces issues relating to conceptual confusion and empirical rigor. The purpose of this chapter is to discuss these critical issues that resilience scholars are currently facing in a way that helps to identify a fruitful path forward in the study of organizational resilience. We argue that, due to its conceptual and empirical messiness, organizational resilience researchers need to be cognizant of the hurdles and decision points they may encounter when conducting their research. Specifically, we point out ways that scholars can think more concretely about their key assumptions and operationalizations of resilience in terms of who, what, when, where, why and how. By doing so, we contend that scholars can collectively advance the study of resilience in organizations in meaningful ways in the next few decades.