Improving resilience in high-risk organizations: principles for the design of innovative training situations

Abstract

Purpose Safety and organizational research indicates that fostering resilience in organizations is a promising way for improving safety, albeit concrete means to implement resilience are still lacking, especially in the educational field. The purpose of this paper is to propose four principles for training design derived from past and current studies the authors conduct in high-risk organizations. Design/methodology/approach Training for resilience is considered within an enactive approach of human activity building on its properties of autonomy, structural coupling, self-organization, emergence, sensemaking, and metastability. Findings The article describes four educational design principles aiming at improving individual, collective, and organizational resilience: encourage mimetic experiences; pay attention to attention and concernedness; perturb and turn into an event; support participatory-sensemaking and collective sensemaking. Research limitations/implications The training program the authors propose may be challenging to assess. Besides, the most durable solutions to improve safety through resilience are to be found at the crossroad between organizational design and training/development policies. Future research should determine the implementability criteria which are likely to support the use of the principles the authors propose, and contribute to enrich this educational foundation. Originality/value Education and training are conceived herein as high-order means to improve safety through resilience in high-risk organizations, fostering the capacity of the operators and organization to develop efficiently and in the long run. We provide independent but complementary training principles that cannot be hierarchized, but that can be locally prioritized in organizations.

The impact of strategic human resource management on organizational resilience: an empirical study on hospitals

“…In any event, it can be said that strategic practices of human resource, increase the organization's ability to develop new solutions to its problems (McIver et al 2018). A study by Blanco (2018) found that staff training has a positive impact on organizational resilience, especially innovative training (Flandin et al 2018). The role of practices involving the employee in a variety of work functions is not forgotten particularly the impact of these practices in the improved level of organizational resilience (Lengnick-Hall et al 2011).…”

“…In terms of high-performance human resources management practices as described by Kooij and Boon (2018), which were training and development as well as work assignments, the results of Blanco (2018) confirmed that training of all kinds is an important element in improving organizational resilience. Flandin et al (2018) also noted that innovative training is an important element in improving individual and group resilience in organizations. Siddiqui (2017) found that training is a critical element for organizational resilience.…”

Formation basée sur la perturbation : preuve de concept par la conception et le test d’un environnement numérique de formation en radiologie médicale

“…Lorsqu'elle est basée sur un principe de perturbation (Flandin, Poizat, & Durand, 2018), la formation vise à perturber le couplage acteur-environnement des formés. À travers l'activité en formation, c'est l'activité cible qui est visée (le travail, dans le cas d'une formation professionnelle) : on espère donc que la perturbation (i) s'accompagne d'un écho « retentissant » dans le travail, et (ii) touche un niveau structuré, « sédimenté » d'activité que l'on peut qualifier de culture (entendue à la suite de Geertz (1973) comme réseaux de significations que les hommes créent et dont ils dépendent eux-mêmes).…”

Sensemaking in Critical Situations and in Relation to Resilience—A Review

“…[58], the authors present a program for training for operational resilience capabilities, emphasizing that training elements should be aimed at sensemaking. Flandin et al [59] argue the design of innovative training situations that are likely to improve individual, collective, and organizational resilience should support participatory-sensemaking and collective sensemaking.…”

“…Several of the remaining publications in this review discuss training that is aimed at enhancing resilience [40,48,57,59,64], which is an important feature in dealing with safety-critical situations.…”