The role of digital techniques in organisational resilience and performance of logistics firms in response to disruptive events: Flooding as an example

Climate change has resulted in the increased frequency and intensity of extreme weather events. One example is flooding, which has driven logistics firms to reconsider their resilience. Although logistics firms can employ digital techniques (DTs) to improve organisational resilience (OR), the interplay of DTs and OR in disruptive events is under-researched. In OR research, few studies have considered the roles of two critical components of DTs, namely digital orientation (DO) and digital competency (DC). This study uses multiple research methods to examine the role of DTs, including DO and DC, in logistics firms' OR during floods. In Phase 1, managers in logistics firms shared their views on the role of DTs for OR during floods through semi-structured interviews, which revealed that DO and DC might affect OR and firm performance through thematic analysis. This study further develops a conceptual framework and the associated hypotheses by combining the findings of Phase 1 with those reported in the literature. In Phase 2, survey data was collected via a self-administrated questionnaire survey, and structural equation modelling was then conducted to test the conceptual model. The results show that DC can positively affect OR and firm performance. DO can directly and positively affect firm performance and indirectly affect OR through the mediation role of DC. This study promotes the development of OR research and bridges the theory-practice gap by clarifying how DTs strengthen OR towards disruptive events.