Images of Resilience: Tamzin Ractliffe

Definitions of resilience have stretched from their origins in the field of engineering and physical, materials science to psychology, natural and socio-ecological systems, infrastructure, cities, urban economies, supply chains and communities in the face of disaster. A growing body of work in the field of organisational resilience has sought to understand how organisations, as complex adaptive systems, respond positively to disruption on all fronts.

In the field of human resource management, organisational resilience strategies, including employee engagement and wellbeing, have become a major area of focus and concern for business and policymakers alike. The Covid pandemic has fuelled this further as employers and policymakers have sought to understand how organisations, and the people who work for them, can better support the ability to survive and thrive in the face of uncertainty and unprecedented changes to the world of work.

While some have focused on the individual capacities that confer resilience, others have examined how the social systems and subsystems within which individuals are embedded, influence a more mediated understanding of resilience. Pivotal to the development of more effective managerial and organisational strategies is a greater understanding of the meaning of resilience as it pertains to people at work, collectively.

This Drinking Dialogues will reflect on how Gareth Morgan’s ‘Images of Organisation’ presents a new way of reflecting on the meaning of resilience, specifically notions of collective or organisational resilience for people in organised human social systems such as the workplace. By understanding how the experience of resilience is influenced by the complex dynamics of institutional structures, both formal and informal, it is hoped we can establish a more inclusive framings of resilience that considers the complex dynamics of how resilience exists in the collective, relational and situated context of work.