Understanding organisational resilience
This week we turn our attention to a crucial model that makes a difference for any forward looking organisation, organisational resilience.
Organisational resilience is an organisation’s ability to anticipate issues ahead of time and develop a plan for handling the identified problems.
The organisational resilience model can be summed up as follows:
λ Foresight (anticipate problems)
λ Insight (interpret the situation and respond accordingly)
λ Oversight (assess the action that has been taken)
λ Hindsight (learn from the experience)
λ Circumsight ( Learn from everything surrounding the organisation)
The ability of an organisation to anticipate and plan for an adverse situation and the eventual outcome will likely be more favorable than if the organisation was taken by surprise by events affecting the organisation.
In highly volatile and uncertain times, organisations need to develop a spirit of resilience which enables them to cope effectively with unexpected events and enable the organisation bounce back from what is affecting it, while ensuring future success.
Organisations need to develop the capacity for resilience. This is consistent with the nature of the VUCA world.
Resilience Indicators
λ Leadership
There is a serious need for strong crisis leadership to provide good management and decision making during times of crisis, while fostering continuous evaluation of strategies and work programs against organisational goals.
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λ Staff engagement
The organisation need to engage and involve staff who understand the link between their own work, the organisation’s resilience, and its long term success. When Staff are empowered and use their skills to solve problems they contribute to the organisation’s ability to be resilient.
λInnovation and creativity
Staff are encouraged and rewarded for using their knowledge in novel ways to solve new and existing problems, and for utilising innovative and creative approaches to developing solutions.
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λ Leveraging knowledge
The need to store critical information in a number of formats and locations and have it accessible by staff.
Allocate roles and share among staff and ensure the staff is trained so that someone will always be able to fill key roles.
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λ Breaking silos
Foster communication and collaboration within and between organizations to enable innovation, shared understanding, and common purpose.
According to Drucker, resilience is not simply the ability to deal with adversity when it appears. Organisational resilience can help businesses prevent crises, deal more effectively with them when they do appear, and then learn from them once they have been resolved.
Chiedza Kadare is an OD Practitioner. You can get in touch with her on WhatsApp/call +263 77 283 0986 or Email chiedza.kadare@gmail.com
Paul Nyausaru is an OD Practitioner and leadership coach. For all your OD interventions and leadership development training you can get in touch with him on WhatsApp/call +263774062756 or Email pnyausaru@gmail.com
