تغییر سازمانی و سخت گیری در حین بحران: بررسی پارادوکس Organizational change and rigidity during crisis: A review of the paradox

1. Introduction The year 2015 should have been a crowning one for Volkswagen. In June, the company surpassed Toyota to become the largest automaker in the world and was well ahead of an ambitious plan laid out by the company’s CEO, Martin Winterkorn, to become “the world’s most profitable, fascinating and sustainable automobile manufacturer”. 1 All that came crashing down on September 18, when the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued a notice of a violation of the Clean Air Act to Volkswagen, alleging that model year 2009e2015 Volkswagen (and Audi) diesel cars equipped with 2.0 L enginesdapproximately 499,000 vehiclesdcontained software designed to circumvent EPA emissions standards. The number of “cheat vehicles” was later revealed to be 11 million worldwide, plunging the automaker’s market value and enveloping the company in a crisis. A company long proud of its engineering talent, and ambitious in its global conquest, was in the throes of a crisis, and as noted by an observer, “At best its reputation was in tatters, at worst its continued existence was in question.” 2 In 2012, the “Kodak moment” came in an unfortunate form for the 131-year-old Eastman Kodak Company, ultimately resulting in its filing for bankruptcy. The progenitor of new technologies imitated by countless newcomers, Kodak found itself in a fullblown crisis, where complacency, inertia, and, often, poorly conceived strategies, all contributed to the downfall of the behemoth. These two events, one momentous for external observers and most managers (Volkswagen) and one slowly emerging yet culminating in a major disaster (Kodak), exemplify the modern, frequently observed phenomena of organizational crises. This leads us to a tantalizing question: how does the process of a firm’s response to a crisis take shape? How do companies respond to crisesdof either external or internal origin (e.g., an external shock, a steep drop in market share, or firm’s own inability to respond to emerging disruption)dsevere enough to threaten their survival? Up to this day, these questions have not been holistically analyzed in the management literature, particularly taking into account that crises are events disrupting an organization’s developmental trajectory at a specific time and place (Maitlis & Sonenshein, 2010; Pearson & Clair, 1998). Getting a handle on answers to the above questions has attained an even greater urgency as markets become more globally integrated and as additional industries face disruption from technological advances, innovative business models, or shifts in regulatory environment from any corner of the globe. Before the rise of globalization, scanning the environment meant focusing on regional contenders and sources of potential competition. In contrast, the entrepreneurial landscape of today can present new challenges to firms from unexpected quarters. When that occurs, do organizations in crisis adjust, changing the established methods of doing business in an attempt to escape from, adapt to, or even thrive on new adversarial circumstances? Or do they choose to stick with the old, known, and tried solutionsdproducts, business models, routines, and policies? In other words, do organizations in crises walk down the trodden path, avoiding any change and trying to ignore the adversity, in the hope that the situation will turn by itself?