How Much Do We Really Know About Employee Resilience?

Abstract

Past research purporting to study employee resilience suffers from a lack of conceptual clarity about both the resilience construct and the methodological designs that examine resilience without ensuring the occurrence of significant adversity. The overall goal of this article is to address our contemporary understanding of employee resilience and identify pathways for the future advancement of resilience research in the workplace. We first address conceptual definitions of resilience both inside and outside of industrial and organizational psychology and make the case that researchers have generally failed to document the experience of significant adversity when studying resilience in working populations. Next, we discuss methods used to examine resilience, with an emphasis on distinguishing the capacity for resilience and the demonstration of resilience. Representative research is then reviewed by examining self-reports of resilience or resilience-related traits along with research on resilient and nonresilient trajectories following significant adversity. We then briefly address the issues involved in selecting resilient employees and building resilience in employees. The article concludes with recommendations for future research studying resilience in the workplace, including documenting significant adversity among employees, assessing multiple outcomes, using longitudinal designs with theoretically supported time lags, broadening the study of resilience to people in occupations outside the military who may face significant adversity, and addressing the potential dark side of an emphasis on resilience.

Building employee resilience through wellbeing in organizations

“…In contrast to the suggestion that organizations should build a resilient workforce by simply hiring resilient individuals (Britt, Shen, Sinclair, Grossman, & Klieger, ; Shin et al, ), recent research supports the notion that leaders can play an active role in building resilience among employees. For instance, evidence suggests that organizations should provide interventions to build existing employees' individual resources prior to any change initiative in order to reduce the strains experienced during organizational change (Shin et al, ).…”

Psychometric Testing of the Resilience at Work Scale Using Indian Sample

“…Moreover, resilience development becomes essential, since employees persistently face adverse situations that necessitate effective adaptation (Kuntz, Näswall, & Malinen, 2016). Recently, a number of scholars and organizational practitioners have emphasized the need to design interventions to enhance resilience among employees (Britt, Shen, Sinclair, Grossman, & Klieger, 2016;Linnenluecke, 2017;Rutter, 2016;Wolfson & Mulqueen, 2016). According to Adrian Lajtha, chief leadership officer at Accenture, quoted in Business Wire (2010), 'resilience is the combination of adaptability, flexibility, and strength of purpose, which may be the new criterion for professional advancement'.…”

“…Recently, the construct of resilience has garnered an intensified attention of behavioural and medical sciences scholars (Britt et al, 2016;King, 2016;Winwood, Colon, & McEwen, 2013). Earlier, the construct of resilience has been investigated profusely in clinical and developmental psychology (Herrman et al, 2011;Luthar, Cicchetti, & Becker, 2000;Robertson et al, 2015;Wagnild & Young, 1993).…”

Organizational factors related to attracting job seekers higher in hardiness

“…Organizations seeking to build a workforce to successfully overcome demanding tasks or thrive during adversity often spend valuable resources on stress management training programs, coping resources, and the selection of the best‐fitting applicants (c.f., Britt, Shen, Sinclair, Grossman, & Kleiger, ). Although these efforts are often valuable to workers, they can lead to high monetary costs, extensive time commitments, and may not always be successful.…”