The Influence Factors of Organizational Resilience from a CSR Perspective and Their Impact on Business Growth

Abstract

Current research has focused on the impact of organizational resilience on a company’s ability to cope with temporary adversity, without considering its role in long-term development. This study applies the grounded theory approach to construct a theoretical model of the factors influencing organizational resilience in long-term development. The model includes six main categories: change readiness, corporate culture and values, systems thinking, social responsibility, resource–information linkages, and leadership, consisting of 47 sub-categories and 99 initial categories. The research findings indicate that all six elements—change readiness, corporate culture and values, systems thinking, social responsibility, resource–information linkages, and leadership—have a positive impact on organizational resilience. Moreover, corporate social responsibility positively influences change readiness, corporate culture and values, systems thinking, resource–information linkages, and leadership. The study also reveals a bi-directional driving mechanism between a company and its management. This research enriches the existing theoretical framework of factors influencing organizational resilience and provides valuable guidance for companies to effectively respond to developmental challenges and achieve long-term growth.

1. Introduction

The internal and external environments that impact businesses’ operations are complex and constantly changing. In recent years, factors such as trade wars and the COVID-19 pandemic have pushed some companies into survival challenges. Moreover, unexpected events and sudden changes pose additional diversities throughout the long-term development of businesses. Various studies have shown that some organizations are more effective than others in coping with unforeseen, unexpected or “extreme” events under similar circumstances [1,2]. These organizations rely on unique mechanisms to survive adversity, and some have even surpassed themselves. Organizational resilience has been used to describe the inherent characteristics of organizations that are able to respond faster, recover faster, or conduct business in more unusual ways than others [3]. Existing research has usefully explored the mechanisms of action of organizational resilience [4,5,6,7], but has mainly focused on the antecedents and outcomes of the effects of organizational resilience, and is unclear about the specific processes through which organizational resilience is formed [8]. Therefore, how companies build organizational resilience has become a topic of academic focus [9].

The introduction of the social responsibility perspective and stakeholder theory finds that corporate fulfilment of social responsibility helps to improve relationships with stakeholders such as government, community, employees, consumers, shareholders, etc., and that these relationships play an important role in corporate sustainability strategies [10]. Sustainability theory suggests that CSR and corporate sustainability have a high degree of internal consistency, and that both organically combine business and society, and are committed to promoting the common progress of business and society [11]. Some empirical studies have found that the fulfilment of corporate social responsibility helps enterprises to maintain financially sustainable growth [12]. Social responsibility is now receiving more and more widespread attention, and the fulfilment of social responsibility can improve a company’s financial performance by enhancing that company’s reputation [13,14], and help the company to obtain financing facilities [15].

Most of the related studies on the relationship between social responsibility and organizational resilience focus on the relationship between social responsibility and the competitive advantage and performance of enterprises, which is considered to be crucial for enterprises to gain and maintain competitive advantage [16,17]. A few scholars, based on reputation theory, believe that the fulfilment of corporate social responsibility can create a good reputation for an enterprise, with it gaining a competitive advantage that is different from other enterprises [18]. On an empirical level, most scholars found that CSR has a direct positive effect on competitive advantage [19], while some scholars also explored the indirect effect of CSR on competitive advantage [20].

This article analyzes the factors that influence organizational resilience during the process of corporate development and growth and examines the mechanism through which social responsibility enhances organizational resilience. Using a case study approach and grounded theory research method, the study constructs a theoretical model of factors influencing organizational resilience in long-term development and explores the role of social responsibility within these factors.

2. Theoretical Basis and Research Hypothesis

2.1. Definition of the Connotation of Organizational Resilience

Organizational resilience has previously been studied by different scholars from different perspectives, with organizational resilience being viewed as either a static capability or a dynamic process, including as an organization’s potential ability to anticipate, avoid, and adapt in response to environmental shocks [21]; as a system’s ability to continue to operate in the face of disruptive shocks [22,23]; and in the overall context of being categorized as able to carry shocks and recover from them [24,25,26]. In addition, Williams and Shepherd [27] and Williams et al. [28] view resilience as a process whereby a firm or group endeavors to avoid adverse reactionary tendencies in a challenging situation, constructing and utilizing all of its capabilities to interact with the environment so as to adjust positively and maintain effective operations before, during, and after adversity.

Resilience is often considered a desirable trait for organizations to possess in order to cope with various types of adversity. Summarizing the research on resilience, Linnenluecke summarizes resilience as (1) an organization’s response to external threats, (2) organizational dependability, (3) employee strengths, (4) the adaptability of the business model, and (5) the reduction of supply chain vulnerability and disruption using design principles [29].

As research goes deeper, scholars in recent years have defined organizational resilience as the exceptional ability of organizations to prepare, adapt, and learn in response to adversity or adverse events in order to enable organizations to respond quickly and flexibly to a crisis and recover from it, or even to go beyond survival and promote greater success [9,30,31,32]. Resilient organizations are able to keep their core competencies intact in the face of sudden crisis events, and are able to reconfigure organizational resources and relationships to enable themselves to quickly recover from crisis [33,34] and achieve counter-trend growth [35].

Research on organizational resilience has occurred in different fields: Ribeiro summarized research on supply chain resilience and defined the pioneering concept of supply chain resilience [36]. Lv et al., on the other hand, through a study of listed companies in China, for the first time explored the five dimensions of CSR in relation to organizational resilience impact [37], but did not elaborate on the mechanism of the role of CSR on organizational toughness. Liang and Cao found that employee toughness is positively correlated with organizational toughness through the study of the high-tech industry, service industry, and traditional manufacturing industry [38].

Research has also taken place on factors affecting organizational resilience: based on studies of organizations of different types, institutional structures, and sizes, previous scholars have derived the factors that contribute to organizations’ smooth passage through crises and distilled assessment indicators of organizational resilience. The assessment indicators of organizational resilience were initially proposed by Somers [39], and then McManus et al. [4] enriched and developed the assessment indicators of organizational resilience, and constructed an assessment model with 13 resilience indicators, including employee engagement, innovation and creativity, and external resource capacity, etc. Fiksel [1] further classified the 13 assessment indicators into three main factors: leadership and culture, networks, and readiness for change.

Equally, there exists research on the mechanisms of organizational toughness: the organizational resilience demonstrated by firms in the face of crisis is usually influenced by organizational resources [28], corporate strategy [29], employee competence [40], collective cognition [40], environmental social practices [33], leader personality traits [21,41], and many other factors.

Although there has been widespread attention on organizational toughness, there are limitations in the existing research, as organizational toughness was only applied to the field of organization management by academics after 1988 [42], research on organizational toughness is still at an early stage [43,44], and China’s research about organizational toughness is still in its infancy. In the exploration of the factors affecting tissue toughness, the understanding of its mechanism of action is not clear.

Combining the above scholars’ elaboration, this paper adopts the viewpoint of Williams and Shepherd and Williams et al. that in the process theory of organizational resilience, organizational resilience not only refers to rebound and upgrade in the face of adversity, but at the same time, it also includes the behaviors of firms that take actions to avoid facing the situation of adversity, i.e., organizational resilience includes coping and reacting to the fact of adversity, and at the same time, it includes preventive behaviors. That is, organizational resilience includes responses and reactions to the fact of adversity, as well as preventive behaviors to prevent adversity from occurring. This is because the prevention of adversity is also an effective means of coping with adversity, so as to avoid the impact of adversity on business growth; therefore, organizational resilience is not only the behavior taken in the face of adversity but also the action taken to avoid an enterprise facing adversity, so the prevention of adversity should also be included in the meaning of organizational resilience. This understanding can combine the process of enterprise growth with organizational resilience, which helps us to understand the mechanism of organizational resilience on the long-term growth of enterprises.

2.2. Social Responsibility

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) refers to the responsibility that a company should have toward its stakeholders in the course of its business operations. The concept of CSR is based on the idea that business operations must be in line with sustainable development. In recent years, CSR has received more and more attention, and companies are considering not only their own financial and operational situation but also their impact on society and the natural environment. As a member of society, a company’s development depends not only on itself but also on a number of factors, and it draws resources from its environment and has a profound impact on it. The construction of CSR in the process of business growth can improve organizational resilience [22], i.e., more socially responsible organizations are better able to recover and grow.

Social responsibility is gaining widespread attention and has become a guiding principle and standard for many organizations, such as the Corporate Social Responsibility Standard (ISO26000) developed by ISO and GRI’s code for the disclosure of non-financial matters, which require companies to better take on more social responsibility.

In the 1980s, Freeman [45] put forward the stakeholder theory, which provided the theoretical basis for the study of CSR and became the mainstream theory of CSR research, proposing that enterprises should not only be responsible to shareholders but also to creditors, employees, suppliers and customers, government, community, and the environment. A series of studies have found that CSR can have a wide range of positive impacts on stakeholders, such as improving corporate brand image and reputation [46,47,48] (for consumers), conferring political legitimacy [49,50] (to the government), fostering customer satisfaction [51,52] (to customers), and improving employee job satisfaction [53] (to employees), facilitating bank loans [54] (with banks), etc. Porter et al. analyzed the relationship between business growth and social welfare and argued that firms should view the fulfilment of their social responsibilities as an opportunity and should compete in a competitive environment to identify social responsibilities that benefit both society and their own development [55]. Flaviu Moldovan et al. integrated social responsibility criteria and developed a model for sustainable development in the healthcare sector [56].

As corporate social responsibility is an important way to maintain relationships with stakeholders [32], does corporate social responsibility build organizational resilience? Bansal et al. classified CSR into two types: short-term and long-term social responsibility, and argued that long-term social responsibility such as corporate responsibility in terms of the environment, employees, human rights, product quality, and safety can have a significant impact on the organizational structure of social responsibility activities [22,57]. Some studies have found that long-term social responsibility leads to less damage and shorter recovery time when firms face crises, which in turn increases organizational resilience [21,22]. Ma Teng et al. revealed the relationship between fulfilling CSR and project-based organizations’ resilience in their study of listed construction engineering companies in China, exploring the mechanism of CSR’s role in project-based organizational resilience [58]. From various studies, it can be found that the construct of CSR improves organizational resilience during business growth [22], i.e., more socially responsible organizations recover and grow better.

Based on the above analysis of the relationship between CSR and organizational resilience, we propose the following hypothesis:

Hypothesis 1.

Social responsibility enhances organizational resilience.

2.3. Enterprise Growth Theory

In Penrose’s book The Theory of Enterprise Growth [59], she argues that intrinsic factors determine enterprise growth, that an enterprise is a combination of a set of resources within a specific managerial framework, and that enterprise growth is a result of the effective coordination of resources and managerial functions by the enterprise. According to Penrose, firm growth is not determined by the equilibrium forces of the market but is driven by the unique forces of each firm itself.

Winter and Nelon [60] argue that firm capabilities are the specific practices of organizations that are manifested in the division of labor and collaboration process, which are the prerequisites for the decision-making activities of members of a firm’s organizations and serve as the key elements that drive the evolution of firm growth. According to Prahalad and Hamel, the essence of entrepreneurial capabilities is “the cumulative learning in an organization, especially about how to coordinate different production skills and organically combine multiple streams of technology” [61]. This is the essence of organizational resilience. From this, we can think that organizational resilience belongs to a kind of enterprise capability, plays an important role in the growth process of an enterprise, and is the core capability of an enterprise.

Lengnick-Hall et al. link organizational resilience to business growth and argue that organizational resilience represents a range of responses from survival to recovery, improvement, and transformation. They believe that by adapting to dynamic environments and capitalizing on opportunities in times of change, organizations can achieve sustained growth [30]. But, there is a lack of corresponding research on the mechanisms at play. Organizational resilience, social responsibility, and business growth have been studied more extensively in the past literature, but little of this has addressed the relationship between social responsibility and the factors influencing the formation of organizational resilience, and the mechanisms by which organizational resilience and business growth work.

Based on previous analyses, organizational resilience constitutes one of the core capabilities of businesses, and we propose a hypothesis accordingly:

Hypothesis 2.

Organizational resilience has a positive impact on business growth.

3. Study Design

3.1. Research Methodology

What are the roles of organizational resilience in the growth process of businesses, and what are the mechanisms of its operation? This is a research topic that needs to be explored. This article uses the grounded theory in qualitative research to elaborate on the aforementioned questions. Grounded theory is a specific method of generating theories from the analysis of empirical materials, with the aim of constructing theories that are adept at examining action and interaction processes, and thus is helpful in answering the research questions in this article.

Grounded theory is an effective qualitative research method, gradually classifying the logical relationships between concepts through the outer phenomena of things, so as to clarify the logical relationship between concepts and form a theoretical system. Charmaz’s constructivist grounded theory research method divides coding into initial coding, focused coding, and theoretical coding. The purpose of initial coding is to generate simple and accurate codes. Focused coding forms concept categories [62], and explains and interprets the data using retrospective discovery and retrospective reasoning [63].

There is no consensus on the factors that affect organizational resilience, and there is a lack of research on the mechanism of organizational resilience from the perspective of social responsibility. Therefore, grounded theory is selected to analyze the sample data, construct a theoretical model of the influencing factors of organizational resilience from the perspective of social responsibility, and adopt a qualitative research method to determine the key influencing factors in the model.

3.2. Data Sources

The research case chosen for this article is New Oriental Education & Technology Group (New Oriental for short), a company with over 30 years of development history and listings in both New York and Hong Kong.

There were numerous internal and external events that influenced the company’s development process, making it a suitable research case. The specific reasons for choosing this case are as follows:

(1)

The education industry is highly relevant in China, and there are many factors that can influence its development. Throughout the company’s history, there have been many events that have had a significant impact on its development, such as the SARS epidemic, public incidents, government policies, and the COVID-19 pandemic, which have all affected the company’s survival at different times.

(2)

New Oriental has a public image, and its founding team is willing to share its experiences. This company was one of the first Chinese companies to be listed in the US, and there is a wealth of relevant research and information available about it. Its founding team is also well known and willing to share its experiences, having given hundreds of lectures and published five books about the company’s history, leaving a rich collection of materials such as videos and texts.

These characteristics enable us to comprehensively understand the factors that influence organizational resilience in the process of enterprise growth and development. We can search for relevant information from different periods of the company’s development, providing abundant resources for studying the relationship between organizational resilience and growth, and its mechanisms. The article collected approximately one million words of data from various sources, selecting about 100,000 words of data that were related to the company’s responses to adversity during its growth process. The types and quantities of selected literature are shown in

Table 1. Data source information.

Related Monographs	Media Coverage	Research Papers	Image Data	Related Presentations	Streaming Information
5 books	16 reports	12 articles	15 episodes	28 times	1061 pieces

below.

4. Qualitative Analysis Based on Grounded Theory

Single-case studies require both “good storytelling” and systematic conceptual coding of the phenomenon. In this part, we use Charmaz’s constructivist grounded theory qualitative research method, and the coding process is divided into initial coding, focused coding, and theoretical coding. The constructivist grounded theory is used because it emphasizes the use of retrospective reasoning to interpret the data in order to discover the inner logic in the data. The constructivist grounded theory helps us to study the meaningful factors that play a role in the transformation process of organizational resilience and business development. In this specific case, it helps us discover the inner logic in the transformation and development process of New Oriental, which helps us find the factors of corporate transformation.

In this paper, the coding steps and process follow the following procedure to code New Oriental’s books, reports, papers, influences, speeches, and streaming information line by line. The information is analyzed one by one using three levels of coding, including retrospective analysis, and finally, the theoretical framework is constructed.

4.1. Initial Coding

At the initial coding stage, the data need to be openly coded, i.e., the data is decomposed into concepts and given labels. The purpose of the initial coding is to discover potential meanings and patterns in the data and provide a basis for subsequent theory building. In this process, the collected case data need to be “labeled” and initially analyzed to form corresponding concepts, and then concepts reflecting the same type of phenomena are grouped into sub-categories. In this paper, we first openly coded the basic data on the logical relationship between CSR, organizational resilience, and corporate development and growth, and then summarized 99 concepts and 47 subcategories after continuous comparison.

4.2. Focused Coding

Focused coding is a more clustered analysis based on the initial coding, in which we use retrospective reasoning to interpret the data in order to discover the inner logic in the data. In this paper, the 47 sub-categories obtained from the initial coding are further grouped together to form 6 main categories.

4.3. Theoretical Coding

Theoretical coding is based on the above coding to further explore the core categories and the relationships among them. After sorting out the categories and their relationships generated at the first two stages, this paper categorizes the core issues into six core categories: readiness for change, social responsibility, systems thinking, resource–information links, corporate leadership, and corporate culture and values. The coding results are listed in the following

Table 2. Coding table of factors influencing tissue toughness.

Initial Code (IC)	Focus Coding (FC)	Theoretical Coding (TC)
Security capabilities to safeguard business operations	Security capabilities	Change preparation
Financial bottom line, cash sufficiency	Financial bottom line
Firm in our goals, firm in our philosophy	Determined goals
Fixing internal governance	Internal governance
Crisis alert	Crisis alert
Crisis awareness
Strategic thinking	Strategic thinking
Think business
Consider the long-term impact
Driving change in thinking
Continuous effort to learn	Continuous learning
Embracing change	Proactive change
Make good products	Quality assurance	Corporate culture and values
Maintaining customers
Virtuous interaction between teaching and learning
External oversight
Quality assurance
Grasp the core principles
Staying true to our values	Adherence to values
Generosity
Adherence to principles
Beyond money, creating value	The pursuit of profit above all else
Timely and honest, with a commitment to refund	Honesty
Employee reflection
Accept with equanimity and look forward	Finding hope from despair
Finding hope from despair
Responsibility for the team	Organizational awareness
Cordial organizational relationship
Formation of style culture	Corporate culture
Inspirational spirit	Spiritual meaning
Spiritual meaning
Not simply to make money	Company sentiment
Employees’ sense of responsibility to the company
Conflict must not affect the company’s development	Company benefits	Social responsibility
Maintaining the organization and ensuring development
Take social responsibility	Social responsibility
Proof of no falsification
Donation of tables and chairs
Selected agricultural products live
Customer satisfaction leads to inner peace	Responsibility to customers
Grasp the law, long-term development	Employee benefits
The best treatment
Give employees a greater development platform
Caring for employees
Equity incentives
Giving young people opportunities for development
Give newcomers a platform
Responsibility to the country	State responsibility
Social value of the company	Social value
Trust from external investors	Investor trust
Responsibility to investors
Investor trust
Living in harmony with competitors	Living in harmony with competitors
Relationship with competitors
Timely correction of wrong practices	Grasp the essence	Systems thinking
The real opponent is yourself
Interest leads to change
Do the right thing, do the right thing	Direction method
Formalization
Path selection
Combination of short-term and long-term
A complete transformation and new business in the pipeline
Error correction mechanism	Grasp the pattern
Grasp the core issues
Resolving internal conflicts
Clear sectoral cooperation and support
Be nold
High demands on partners	High demands on the organization
Pros and cons analysis	Rational patience
The process of reform
Dynamic benefit distribution mechanism	Reasonable distribution
Know the business, multiple people responsible
Supply chain, product chain, investment chain	Establishing a business model
Help from friends	External resources	Resource–information links
Hire external brains
Promote company development
Integration with the trend of the times	Discover the opportunity
Discover your potential
Finding opportunities in a crisis
Internal and external stakeholders win together	Unity and winning together
Organizational learning, courageous innovation	Learning to try
Thinking about change
Keep trying
Keep progressing	Learning power	Leadership
Know the deficiency
Self-driven	Self-drive
Sense of accomplishment	Sense of accomplishment
Government recognition
No false accounting	Bottom-line thinking
Bottom-line thinking
Reflective power	Reflective power
Decisive transformation	Decisive decision-making
argue strongly against the masses
Perseverance and hard work	Perseverance and hard work
Entrepreneurship and commitment	Commitment
Cost saving, crisis awareness	Crisis awareness
Encourage employees	Encourage employees
Recognition of employees
Organizational structure for development	High-level collaboration

.

4.4. Theoretical Saturation Test

This article collected public information related to the enterprise, such as books, speeches, videos, research materials, and streaming media information, which totaled about 1 million words in text. Among them, about 100,000 words of data were selected from the materials related to coping with adversity in the process of corporate development and growth. A small portion of the selected data was used as validation material to test the saturation of the theoretical model. The results showed that all extracted semantic meanings were embodied in the 99 initial concept characteristics, and no new conceptual categories emerged, nor did the logical relationship between concepts change. After analyzing the data, no new conceptual categories were found; thus, it was concluded that the theoretical model has reached saturation.

5. Research Findings

5.1. Corporate Culture and Values and Organizational Resilience

(1)

Corporate culture and values are the foundation of organizational resilience, which provide common goals, direction, and motivation, enhance employees’ sense of belonging and identity, and promote communication and collaboration within an organization. New Oriental has built a mature corporate culture of core principles and values in its development history. By improving the assessment, New Oriental has determined that teaching quality, “content is king”, and selected teaching content have formed a consistent teaching style in New Oriental, which is responsible for its students; in the teaching process, the spirit of inspiration is given to establish the spiritual significance of the product and form an inspirational corporate culture, which also lays the foundation for the company to handle adversity The company’s culture and values are recognized by employees, and they do not only work at New Oriental to make money but also to achieve self-worth. The core employees of the company have reduced their salary by 60–70%, but still no one has left, identifying with the cultural sentiment and values of New Oriental, which makes the employees have a greater sense of achievement, which is also a sense of gain for the work paid: forming a value pursuit beyond money, creating value, being remembered by society, and at the same time, considering in the long run long-term planning that is beneficial to the development of the society.

(2)

Corporate values are a guarantee of organizational resilience, which provide a set of behavioral norms and decision-making principles to help employees stay calm and rational in a crisis and avoid blind decisions or overreaction. In the organizational change in New Oriental, a harmonious organizational relationship guarantees the common progress of the company and the employees; when the company is facing a difficult time in management, the good values guarantee that although there is a power struggle, all of them can abide by the company’s values and none of them behave in such a way that violates the professional bottom line and the company’s interests, and not affect the development of the company.

(3)

Corporate values are the driving force of organizational resilience. They provide a culture of innovation and learning that inspires employees to seek new opportunities and solutions in crises and to continuously improve and optimize their own capabilities and competitiveness. When New Oriental encounters development adversity, values such as error correction, perseverance, pursuit beyond money, and exploration of social values allow the company to continuously search for ideas and methods to deal with adversity and find future opportunities within the company.

Based on the above analysis, we have identified the impact mechanisms of corporate culture and values on organizational resilience, as shown in Figure 1 below.

In summary, we obtain the proposition that corporate culture is related to values and organizational resilience:

Proposition 1.

Establishing and adhering to the right and effective corporate culture and values effectively enhances organizational resilience.

5.2. Systems Thinking and Organizational Resilience

Systems thinking is an advanced thinking skill that enables one to view complex problems from a holistic and dynamic perspective and analyze their causes, impacts, and solutions. Systems thinking can help organizations become more resilient; it allows them to better understand their relationship with the external environment, identify potential risks and opportunities, and develop effective strategies and actions.

(1)

New Oriental’s systematic thinking is reflected in its grasp of the essential laws. In the face of competitors, it proposes that the biggest competitor is not others, but itself, avoiding inefficient competition with competitors, but focusing on itself, sinking its heart into improving the quality of teaching and improving the quality of teachers, adjusting short-term, profit-oriented assessment indicators and establishing a long-term teaching and learning mechanism, so that New Oriental’s performance after 15 years resumed a faster growth rate.

(2)

In the way of doing things, it insists on combining long-term interests and short-term interests, and emphasizes insisting on doing the right things and doing things right. In the development process of New Oriental, facing the problem of relying on other institutions and hindering long-term development, it firmly established the long-term idea of formalization; in the face of introducing partner mechanisms and carrying out shareholding system transformation, it decisively went to family, properly established internal family members, and established a corporate governance system, which is conducive to the long-term development of the company according to the development path of modern enterprises; in the face of the “Dual Reduction Policy” (In China’s education sector, this refers to a policy aimed at effectively reducing the heavy homework and extracurricular training burden on students in compulsory education.), it decisively stopped all K-9 subject tutoring business, and at the same time, it conceived new business in the context of long-term development.

(3)

New Oriental maintains rational patience and establishes a dynamic interest protection adjustment mechanism during the company’s shareholding reform process. In order to protect the development of the company, it maintains rational patience when appeasing the core personnel of the company and recognizes that reform is a gradual process; it treats a listing, fully analyzes the advantages and disadvantages, builds on the strengths and avoid the weaknesses, and also prepares psychologically in advance for the problem of the tendency toward short-term interest after a listing, so as to respond to them in a timely and stable manner.

(4)

It always guarantees the quality of teaching and service in the teaching process. Even if it gives up short-term development, it is determined not to let unqualified teachers into the classroom, while introducing external supervision and internal scoring to protect the interests of teachers and motivate them to improve their business.

A grasp of the law, a deep understanding of its essence, and a rational distribution of benefits while maintaining rational patience constitute the systemic thinking that enhances an organization’s ability to cope in the face of adversity, and its mechanism of action is illustrated in Figure 2 below.

From this, we obtain Proposition 2:

Proposition 2.

Systematic thinking can improve organizational resilience.

5.3. Resource–Information Links and Organizational Resilience

Resource–information linkage capability refers to an organization’s ability to effectively use internal and external resources and information to improve its adaptability and competitiveness in the face of an uncertain and complex environment. Resource–information linkage capability can help organizations reduce vulnerability by actively seeking effective ways to respond to adversity and enhance resilience via resource–information linkage.

(1)

In terms of the full use of external professional resources, facing the shorting of New Oriental, the company mobilized the resources of an entrepreneurial circle of friends to stabilize the stock price; facing the problem of shareholding reform, the company actively hired external brains, introduced the best consulting company to “consult and take the pulse” of the long-term development of the company, introduced journalists who dare to expose the problems of the company, fully investigated and coordinated the internal problems of New Oriental, and introduced third-party investment companies to help the development of the company’s IPO. The study found that New Oriental has been able to make a significant contribution to its own long-term development. The study found that New Oriental has always kept an open mind in standardized operation, which is beneficial to the long-term development of the company, and proactively connects with external resources, which also helps New Oriental to solve many problems quickly and promote the development of the company.

(2)

In terms of grasping opportunities for business development, the company widely understands a variety of information resources combined with the trends of the times, discovers its potential, and strives to find opportunities in adversity. At the early stage of New Oriental’s development, it discovered the emerging field of overseas training and tried to find development opportunities by combining its own advantages; it introduced a partnership system, a modern enterprise management style, a overseas venture capital fund, and overseas listings, which provided better resources for the rapid development of the company; after the “Dual Reduction Policy” was implemented, the company developed the new business of live streaming in a timely manner, making full use of its own teachers’ high level of knowledge accumulation, strong theoretical literacy, and feature of not exaggerating propaganda, so that the live streaming business developed rapidly.

(3)

Learning ability is also a reflection of information linking ability. In the face of the development dilemma, Yu actively seeks solutions and has studied almost half of an MBA course by himself to find a way out of the company’s governance dilemma; he holds regular and irregular learning activities of the company and overseas study tours to learn about the market, marketing, and strategy, and other courses to provide a clearer understanding and appreciation of work ideas and strategic layout.

(4)

Maintaining a better relationship with customers, competitors, and other related stakeholders can also provide resources and information for the development of a company. Facing the process of introducing overseas funds, the head of the Tiger fund is a former student of Yu Minhong; in the process of introducing partners, the respect of college students studying abroad for Yu Minhong also makes the partners put down their worries and join the partner team, which promotes the development of the company; the respect of competitors is obtained and a good competitive environment is established; in the process of the company’s IPO roadshow, the trust and support of investors in New Oriental helps the company achieve smooth listings.

This paper finds that the linkage of various resources and information in the process of enterprise development provides a better external environment, a better competitive environment, and better development opportunities for the development of the company. The ability to link resources and information also reflects the company’s culture and values, and the ability to think systematically.

As analyzed above, we have identified the mechanism of action of resource-information links on organizational resilience, as shown in Figure 3 below.

From this, we obtain Proposition 3:

Proposition 3.

The linkage of resources and information enhances organizational resilience. The ability to link resources and information is reflected not only in change-seeking active access but also in passive trust-based access to resources and information.

5.4. Leadership and Organizational Resilience

Leadership reflection, decisive decision-making, perseverance in effort and self-drive, learning power to maintain progress, sense of achievement and responsibility for one’s own business, bottom-line thinking in the process of business development, and sense of purpose for the future development of the company constitute the core leadership values of the company, helping the company to effectively cope with adversity and enhance organizational resilience.

(1)

We see a sense of responsibility and the self-drive of business leadership, the ability to pursue personal and organizational progress, and the ability to “find hope in despair” and find solutions to problems even when faced with difficulties achieve business growth. The management of New Oriental has a strong sense of responsibility and a strong sense of responsibility to do well as an enterprise; it keeps learning and has a strong self-drive, whether it is Yu Minhong himself, the seamless switching of bilingualism during the live broadcast of e-commerce, or the quotation of historical allusions and the profound understanding of all life situations, which reflects the professional ability and solid foundation, but also reflects the strong self-drive of New Oriental and the desire to explore unknown fields.

(2)

In this paper, bottom-line thinking and no false accounting are listed as a reflection of leadership, while the financial bottom line is listed as readiness for change. This is because bottom-line thinking and not making false accounts reflect the character of managers and are the embodiment of leadership, while financial bottom-line thinking is the advanced planning of the company in response to financial difficulties and belongs to preparation for change. In the development process of New Oriental, insisting on bottom-line thinking, insisting on good classes, not letting unqualified teachers on the podium, and not behaving in a way harmful to customers, competitors, and society have established a better foundation for the company to deal with developmental adversity, and not making false accounts has established a good foundation for the company to go public smoothly and deal with the “shorting” of the Muddy Waters fund, the foundation for the company’s smooth listing and comfortable response.

(3)

Management’s ability to learn, reflect and make decisions helps the company clarify its development ideas, discover new business, and safeguard the company’s development and growth process to avoid excessive internal conflicts and stay on the right development track. The leadership’s ability to learn and reflect enables it to constantly review and think about the adversities encountered in the development of the company, seek opportunities, and gain growth and development from them. New Oriental’s management does not complain and is not discouraged in the face of adversity, and is brave enough to learn from itself and innovate itself. The ability to make decisions can help the company quickly control adversity and effectively deal with a complex situation. When New Oriental faced the “Dual Reduction Policy”, it stopped all K-9 tutoring business by the end of 2021 in accordance with the national policy, and promised students unconditional and proportional refunds, actively stating and supporting the national decision with its actions. After discontinuing the K-9 business, it proposed to shift its focus and most of its resources to other educational products and services in the future, while brewing the development of “live band” business. The ability to make decisions allows the company to adjust its development strategy in a timely manner, stabilize the internal situation, and quickly position the company’s goals toward new growth points, avoiding the loss of talented employees and missed opportunities for growth.

(4)

Collaboration at the top and encouragement of employees can guarantee the company to motivate and stabilize key talents to cope with business changes and development smoothly. This is the softer side of leadership. Collaboration at the top reflects solidarity and smooth communication among the top, and encouragement of employees reflects emotional care for employees, which is conducive to employees gaining a sense of belonging and inspiring their own dedication. During the partnership period, New Oriental’s partners built a smooth communication environment among themselves, and although there were arguments, they were all about achieving better development for the company, and eventually reached a consensus. New Oriental’s management often holds reunions with grassroots employees, communicates regularly, cares for employees, respects employees, communicates with employees, and tolerates employees, and New Oriental effectively manages knowledge-based employees emotionally. It helps New Oriental to deal with development adversity effectively and stimulate employees’ work consciousness, work enthusiasm, and work potential.

As analyzed above, we have identified the mechanism of action of leadership on organizational resilience, as shown in Figure 4 below.

This leads to the proposition in this paper on leadership and organizational resilience:

Proposition 4.

Leadership has a positive effect on organizational resilience, and leadership helps to enhance organizational resilience and achieve business growth.

5.5. Change Readiness and Organizational Resilience

When companies face uncertain environments and sudden adversities, advanced preparation for change enables them to respond well, quickly adjust their strategies, restore their effectiveness, and even turn crises into opportunities.

(1)

In terms of security capability and financial bottom-line thinking, in the field of internal control, the security capability is integrated into the business line of the company to ensure the safety, stability, and sustainable operation of the core business; adhering to financial bottom-line thinking, in the face of huge refunds from students or the creation of new areas of live streaming, may be in danger, in terms of sufficient room for financing. Companies that hold fast to the bottom line show strong self-discipline, on the one hand, have a strong determination, and will not develop business that does not meet the long-term direction of the company, to avoid the losses caused by poor decisions; on the other hand, it can help companies to have the ability to respond adequately in the face of adversity.

(2)

Having firm goals and either being urgent or slow to do things adhere to the correct direction of development. “As long as the direction is correct, the concept is correct, and the values are correct, there is no hurry and no slow to make the platform bigger”. In the face of rushing and profit-oriented moves in the field of education and training, New Oriental insists on doing things that are beneficial to the growth of students, to the development of society, and to the future of China. It insists on using the true form of education and practicing the reality of education to cultivate its students into modern citizens with “lifelong learning, global vision, and independent personality”.

(3)

In terms of continuous learning, active change, and long-term strategic thinking, New Oriental’s management often discusses the long-term impact of business model changes, emphasizing the importance of “clarifying business thinking, adjusting organizational structure, changing the pattern of interests, and promoting ideological transformation”. Since its inception, New Oriental has advocated for the concept of employee learning and growth, making it a standard for performance evaluation that employees must finish 20 books a year, while managers must read 40. Therefore, New Oriental’s teachers have high humanistic literacy and knowledge reserves, so they can not only provide high-quality teaching products in the classroom, but also demonstrate their talent, share their philosophical wisdom, and elucidate life philosophy in the live classroom. They can share their cultural taste, deep thinking, and valuable products in different fields.

Based on the comprehensive analysis, the model illustrating the mechanism of action of change readiness on organizational resilience is presented in Figure 5 below.

Obtained is Proposition 5 on the relationship between readiness for change and organizational resilience:

Proposition 5.

Change readiness enhances organizational resilience and facilitates effective corporate response to change.

5.6. Social Responsibility and Organizational Resilience

CSR has a positive effect on organizational resilience, and organizations that are more socially responsible have faster recovery from the global economic crisis [21]. In this paper, we found that CSR runs through many processes in the development and growth of enterprises, that the development of enterprises is closely related to taking social responsibility, and that the process of taking social responsibility is conducive to overcoming development adversity and enhancing organizational resilience.

(1)

Place the development of the enterprise in the context of national development and world development, and take the initiative to assume social responsibility. While combining the development of an enterprise with the development of the country and the world, an enterprise needs to consider its own value pursuit. New Oriental not only considers its own profit maximization but also wants to benefit society and the surrounding environment.

(2)

The trust of investors and harmonious coexistence with competitors are needed. In the face of malicious shorting, the best independent law firms, financial firms, and audit firms in the world are hired at a high price, and a joint independent investigation team is formed by them to investigate New Oriental in every detail, so as to prove that New Oriental has not falsified, fulfill the responsibility of corporate lawfulness and compliance, and be responsible to investors.

(3)

Actively participate in social welfare. In the process of the business transformation faced by New Oriental, the original resources are redundant, and all 250,000 sets of tables and chairs are donated to rural areas and mountainous areas. On the one hand, New Oriental continues to provide educational services through specific projects, and, on the other hand, it conducts rural education research and finds some universal problems to form proposals for the two sessions of the National People’s Congress, thus causing the relevant departments to re-examine the policies or drawing the attention of socially relevant parties. Since its establishment, New Oriental has continued to deliver public welfare services to more than 20 provinces, including Tibet, Qinghai, Sichuan, and Yunnan, with a public welfare cash donation of 350 million RMB, training 40,000 rural teachers, rewarding 20,000 college students nationwide, and benefiting more than 200,000 teachers and students from various donations and courses. New Oriental will continue to move forward on the road of rural education and public welfare.

(4)

Be responsible to customers and teach classes to the highest level, “so that we can achieve a state of inner peace”. New Oriental teachers must go through 30 training sessions before they officially teach. In terms of educational philosophy, training occurs at least three times a year with at least two days training each time, which lays a solid foundation for improving teaching quality and transmitting the right values.

As analyzed above, we have derived the model illustrating the mechanism of action of social responsibility on organizational resilience, as shown in Figure 6 below.

In summary, this paper yields the proposition that social responsibility and organizational resilience are related, and we have verified Hypothesis 1:

Proposition 6.

Social responsibility has a positive effect on organizational resilience.

5.7. Social Responsibility and Change Readiness, Corporate Culture and Values, Systems Thinking, Resource–Information Linkage, and Leadership

This paper finds that organizational resilience is influenced by the same factors of change readiness, corporate culture and values, systems thinking, resource-information linkages, and leadership that reflect CSR.

(1)

With social responsibility and change readiness, CSR can more fully prepare an enterprise for change and thus enhance organizational resilience.

The study found that New Oriental’s adherence to a bottom-line financial mindset and the implementation of conservative financial policies throughout the year is a reflection of the company’s active sense of social responsibility, which safeguards its ability to cope with adversity. When New Oriental responded to the SARS epidemic, in order to complete timely payment of the remaining tuition fees and teacher severance payments in a short period of time, it set the rule of setting aside sufficient cash to prepare for various development adversities in the future and avoid unnecessary non-core business expenses. It was the bottom-line thinking in finance that ensured that the company was able to pay out the tuition fees for all students and severance payments for tens of thousands of employees, totaling 20 billion yuan, in a very short period of time after the “Dual Reduction Policy”.

(2)

Social responsibility and corporate culture and values in corporate fulfillment of social responsibility are conducive to the formation of the correct corporate culture and values, while excellent corporate culture and values are also conducive to the active fulfillment of social responsibility.

Responsibility to students and parents requires New Oriental to adhere to teaching quality and improve teaching quality; responsibility to employees and to society requires the company to pay severance pay in full to employees in a timely and honest manner, and to recall old employees who leave in a timely manner when new business develops. At the same time, the enterprise’s sense of social responsibility also affects the employees’ sense of responsibility to the enterprise. Despite a 60–70% drop in salary and a more than 90% drop in share price, no one left, reflecting the employees’ responsibility to the enterprise. The responsibility to employees makes employees identify with the company in a more spiritual sense, not only according to the aspect of salary benefits, which shows that social responsibility plays a better positive role in the formation of excellent corporate culture and values.

Meanwhile, this paper finds that excellent corporate culture and values also help companies actively fulfill their social responsibilities. The pursuit of the company’s interests above all else makes it more concerned with the common development of the company and the internal and external environment; the company’s frank communication style is conducive to forming better relationships with stakeholders; and the adherence to values helps the company not to act against the interests of society.

(3)

Social responsibility and system thinking: fulfillment of social responsibility is conducive to the formation of the system thinking of enterprises.

In order to fulfill its social responsibility to shareholders and establish a modern enterprise management system, New Oriental began to prepare for its IPO. In the process of going public, New Oriental fully analyzed the pros and cons and gave up the domestic listing route whose mechanism was not conducive to the long-term development of the company and chose to go public overseas. After going public, the capital raised in US dollars will be invested in R&D, integrating education into the world and bringing quality resources to China. During the listing process, New Oriental fully combines the interests of its shareholders, investors, and internal employees with the long-term development of the company. The company insists on doing the right things and doing things right, fully considers the internal and external environment of the company, considers the demands of relevant stakeholders regarding the development of the company, grasps the essence, forms the effective internal collaboration ability of the company, and looks for areas that meet the future development direction of the company.

(4)

Social responsibility and resource–information linkage: CSR enhances the resource–information linkage ability.

Companies that take a proactive approach to social responsibility will have more resources and access to information, further enhancing organizational resilience and strengthening their ability to cope with adversity. New Oriental sticks to the financial bottom line and does not make fake accounts. In the face of overseas capital shorting and a 60 percent drop in stock price overnight, Yu Minhong called his entrepreneur friends to dinner, and their response was, “Don’t talk about it, drink”. On the same day, he started to buy New Oriental, which stabilized the New Oriental stock price. In the process of development, New Oriental has ensured teaching quality and improved teaching quality, provided New Oriental teachers with the highest salary package in the industry, refrained from non-normalized competition with competitors, and repaid grievances with virtue, gaining the respect of students and parents, employees, competitors, and investors. When the company encountered development adversity, former stakeholders also actively gave back to the development of New Oriental. It can be found that this is because the enterprise has fulfilled its social responsibility and enhanced its ability to link resources and information.

(5)

Social responsibility and leadership: social responsibility awareness enhances corporate leadership.

A sense of CSR helps companies improve their leadership. A sense of social responsibility also enhances corporate management’s self-drive and sense of responsibility. New Oriental’s sense of achievement is built on a sense of social responsibility, “to be able to bring benefits and progress to society is to rub the individual and society together and do things that are good for both”. Social responsibility enables companies to make continuous progress and hold on to their professional bottom line. It helps corporate management to look for areas that create more value for the future when it comes to future development opportunities. CSR strengthens the company’s decisive ability to resolutely refrain from actions that undermine social values in the face of new business areas for future development, avoiding the negative effects of the short-term, profit-oriented nature of the company’s online business. Awareness of social responsibility helps the management of the company to keep learning and apply the latest technology to the development process of the company. When live e-commerce is in chaos, New Oriental carries out its live e-commerce business with a responsible attitude, starting from the most difficult agricultural products, linking farmers and consumers, and bringing good and healthy products to consumers. We can present the above summary in the following,

Table 3. Social responsibility and readiness for change, corporate culture and values, systems thinking, resource–information linking, and leadership.

Influencing Factors		Performance of Actions		The Response Outcomes
Bottom-line thinking in finance	→	Protects the interests of employees and customers	→	A sense of social responsibility is reflected in the preparation for change
Adhering to teaching quality, teaching quality, holding home education; recalling veteran staff	→	Responsibility to students and parents, responsibility to staff, significant drop in pay, no core staff leaving	→	A sense of social responsibility is reflected in corporate culture and values
Full analysis of the pros and cons	→	Doing the right things and doing things right, considering the internal and external environment of the enterprise and the demands of relevant stakeholders, grasping the essence, forming an effective internal collaboration capability of the enterprise, and looking for areas that meet the future development direction of the enterprise	→	Social responsibility is reflected in systems thinking
No false accounting	→	Get more information on resources	→	Social responsibility is reflected in the link to resource information
Do what is good for both individuals and society	→	Make continuous progress in the business, stick to the professional bottom line, and look for areas to create more value for the future	→	Social responsibility is reflected in corporate leadership

.

The model for social responsibility, corporate culture and values, systems thinking, resource–information linkage, corporate leadership, and readiness for change is in Figure 7:

From the above analysis, the paper obtains the proposition that the relationship between social responsibility and corporate culture and values, systems thinking, resource–information linkage, corporate leadership, and readiness for change:

Proposition 7.

Social responsibility can also affect organizational resilience by influencing readiness for change, corporate culture and values, resource–information linkage, systems thinking, and leadership.

Through the above analysis, we have identified the six elements of organizational resilience and, through a case study, discovered the mechanism by which readiness for change, corporate culture and values, resource–information linkage, systems thinking, leadership, and social responsibility collectively enable enterprises to effectively cope with challenges and achieve long-term development. In the process of enterprise development, it is the combined effect of these six elements that enables enterprises to effectively respond to adversity and achieve sustainable growth. Thus, we have verified Hypothesis 2.

5.8. Two-Wheel Model of Personal and Corporate Growth

This paper finds that corporate development and management’s personal development are inextricably linked, and that New Oriental’s development and management’s personal development achieve and promote each other. It is found that the factors influencing New Oriental’s organizational resilience and personal resilience have the same internal logic.

From the analysis, we obtain a two-wheel drive model for the growth of the firm and the personal growth of the firm’s management, as shown in Figure 8.

(1)

Self-drive: early in a company’s development, the founder’s self-drive lays the early foundation for the company’s growth.

Yu Minhong’s personal psychological drive to pursue higher levels of development led him to start a tutoring class, and after being informed of the criticism, he realized that there was little room for development in the future, at which point self-drive led him to make the decision to resign and start becoming a real entrepreneur. Individuals with a strong self-driven ability feel the desire to enter university, the desire to go abroad, the desire to do well in training, the desire to realize a company’s listing, the desire to do something practical as education, the desire to do something for farmers, and so on; step by step, these drove Yu Minhong himself to explore, learn, and transform into action with tenacity until he had “made the thing”. Self-drive can be thought of as the embodiment of personal values; reflected in Yu Minhong himself is the value of not being willing to be mediocre, accomplishing things for oneself and helping others. This personal self-drive has gradually developed into the culture and values of the company.

(2)

Exploratory learning power: the exploratory learning power of individuals in New Oriental management has played an important role in the development of these individuals and New Oriental.

Yu Minhong memorized more than 20,000 English words and read more than 300 books during his break from school when he was sick, and his personal desire to go abroad drove him to complete the accumulation of knowledge and lay the foundation for his training business; during the development of the company, Yu Minhong kept self-learning and realized the smooth listing of the company. After the emergence of new media, Yu Minhong opened a TikTok account to read, recommend books, and sell books via live video. This all reflects the exploratory learning ability of New Oriental’s management individuals. At the same time, while exploring learning ability, it helps the organization to form the ability of systems thinking, a grasp of the essential law of company development, a systematic understanding of things, etc.

(3)

The power of action: the power of action of individual New Oriental management is also an essential factor driving personal success.

When he realized that he could not achieve his ideal life through teaching, he resigned and left immediately; when the domestic listing caused short-term interest-oriented moves, he gave up the domestic listing and returned the capital invested by the institution; after the “Dual Reduction Policy” was implemented, he donated tables and chairs, returned the rent, refunded the fees, and completely withdrew from K-9 education; when he realized that live broadcast had become a new sales model, he decisively transitioned into a live broadcast model with goods. Action power needs to explore the knowledge accumulation provided by learning power in order to avoid the mistakes caused by action. This paper finds that the action power of individual New Oriental management and the company’s ability to link resources and information complement each other, and the action power promotes the formation of the organization’s ability to link resources and information.

(4)

The personal resilience of managers contributes to the enhancement of organizational resilience.

In the case of New Oriental, the resilience of the founder of the organization is the initial reason for the formation of organizational resilience. Yu Minhong’s personal resilience is reflected in his growth process: he did not give up his dream of studying at university even though he had taken the college entrance examination three times; he practiced hard in speaking when he was not good at speaking; in the process of establishing a training course, he spent half a year “fighting” for the license to run the school; he drove his powerful mother away from the company for the sake of shareholding reform; he had a power struggle with his partners. He could have given up the decision-making power with the partners, but still insisted on learning the knowledge of corporate governance, and so on. It can be said that Yu Minhong’s personal development process reflects his personal characteristics of toughness, which also permeates the corporate culture and values of New Oriental. As the founder and actual controller of New Oriental, Yu Minhong is also the spiritual pillar of New Oriental, and his resilience has played an irreplaceable role in the formation of New Oriental’s organizational resilience.

(5)

The role of opportunity in the process of personal development of management is equally irreplaceable.

The opportunities presented by this era played an irreplaceable role in the growth process of both Yu Minhong and New Oriental. The trend of studying abroad created a need for language training, which led to the establishment and rapid development of New Oriental. The wave of overseas IPOs provided New Oriental with an opportunity to go public and achieve rapid growth. When live streaming e-commerce emerged with its own set of issues, New Oriental promptly introduced EasyBuy live-streaming e-commerce. However, it was also observed that not everyone can seize opportunities. As the saying goes, “opportunities always favor those who are prepared”. The idea of providing training for studying abroad at New Oriental originated from many years of exploration in the field by Yu Minhong and his partners. The successful overseas IPO was due to New Oriental’s sound financial situation and partners’ shared ideals and aspirations, while the popularity of EasyBuy was the result of New Oriental staff’s early understanding of live streaming e-commerce. It was found that seizing opportunities in the personal development of management is driven by four factors: self-drive, exploratory learning abilities, action orientation, and sense of responsibility.

Research has found that as enterprise growth and management development are mutually reinforcing, self-drive, exploratory learning abilities, action orientation, and sense of responsibility, along with the ability to seize opportunities, constitute the basis of enterprise culture and values, systematic thinking, resource and information linkages, fulfilling social responsibilities, and preparing for change. The reactions of enterprises to the difficulties faced during their development represent the externalization of the internal-growth-driving factors of management. Therefore, it is important for companies to maintain the growth ability of their core management team in order to cope with the problems encountered during future development.

In the development of New Oriental, the personal factors of the founder of the company play an irreplaceable role. The founder’s self-driven, exploratory learning, action, and resilience correspond to the formation of corporate culture and values, a systems thinking approach, the ability to link consulting information, and organizational resilience, respectively. Personal growth and corporate growth are intertwined and irreplaceable. The growth of individuals promotes the growth of enterprises; whether it is the successful listing of New Oriental after Yu Minhong studied half of the MBA course during the shareholding reform or the transformation of New Oriental into vocational education, family education, and live e-commerce after the implementation of the “Dual Reduction Policy”, all of this reflects the role of personal growth in promoting the growth of organizations; at the same time, the growth of enterprises also promotes the growth of individuals. During the shareholding system transformation, facing the chronic problems of family business, it was the support of the organization that made Yu Minhong face adversity and smoothly transform New Oriental from a family business into a modern shareholding company, laying a good foundation for the listing. The two-wheel drive of individual and enterprise organization, facing adversity and challenges together, relying on the six elements of enterprise growth and the five factors of personal development, finally achieved the dual goal of personal and enterprise organization development together.

6. Research Conclusions and Outlook

6.1. Research Findings and Theoretical Contributions

This paper systematically examines the factors influencing the growth and development of New Oriental and finds that the six elements of readiness for change, corporate culture and values, systems thinking, resource–information linkage capability, social responsibility, and leadership have influenced the formation of organizational resilience in New Oriental, and the six elements have effectively enhanced the organization’s ability to cope with adversity and promoted corporate growth. Further research found that social responsibility awareness is integrated into the five elements of corporate culture and values, systems thinking, resource linkage capability, and leadership, and effectively enhances organizational resilience.

First, this paper finds that establishing and adhering to a correct and effective corporate culture and values effectively enhances organizational resilience. New Oriental’s corporate culture and values enable employees to go beyond the pursuit of money above all else. Good values ensures employees don’t act against the company’s interests despite the struggle for power, which promotes the growth of the company; it provides a cultural atmosphere for innovation and learning, which inspires employees to seek new opportunities and solutions in crises.

Second, systems thinking has a positive effect on organizational resilience. A grasp of the essential laws of business, a combination of long-term and short-term interests, the insistence on doing the right thing and doing things right, the insistence on rationality and patience, progressive reforms, and other systems thinking significantly enhance the ability of companies to cope with adversity in the growth process.

Third, linkage of resources and information enhances organizational resilience. Meanwhile, the study found that the linkage ability between resources and information is not only reflected in change-seeking active access, but also in passive trust-based access to resources and information.

Fourth, leadership has a positive effect on organizational resilience, and leadership helps to enhance organizational resilience and achieve business growth. Leadership reflection, decisive decision-making, perseverance in effort and self-drive, learning power to maintain progress, a sense of achievement and responsibility for one’s own business, bottom-line thinking in the process of business development, and a sense of purpose in the future development of the business constitute the core leadership of New Oriental, and these factors can help the company deal with adversity effectively and enhance organizational resilience.

Fifth, readiness for change enhances organizational resilience and facilitates effective response to change. On the one hand, change readiness is a process of planning ahead and improving the ability to cope with change, and on the other hand, it is also a process of proactive change and long-term strategic thinking.

Sixth, social responsibility has a positive effect on organizational resilience, and social responsibility affects organizational resilience by influencing change readiness, corporate culture and values, resource–information linkage, systems thinking, and leadership. That is, companies can enhance their organizational resilience by proactively fulfilling social responsibility, making adequate change preparation, obtaining correct and effective value shares, helping companies to obtain external resources’ information, improving the level of system thinking, and growing the leadership of companies.

Seventh, through an in-depth and systematic analysis of the New Oriental case, we have obtained a two-wheel drive model of corporate and personal growth, which is expressed in the process of corporate development through the six elements of organizational resilience in response to environmental changes, and in the process of personal growth through personal self-drive, exploratory learning, action, and personal resilience and personal growth in successfully grasping opportunities.

6.2. Management Inspiration

First, whether in daily operational management or in the face of adverse situations, enterprises should attach great importance to fulfilling corporate social responsibility and integrate the fulfillment of social responsibility into the whole process of enterprise development. Although more and more enterprises are beginning to pay attention to the fulfillment of social responsibility, the degree of attention is still far from enough, as seen in the importance of internal interests, ignoring external interests; the importance of short-term interests, ignoring long-term interests; and the importance of explicit interests, ignoring implicit interests, which may lead to the lack of social organizational resilience in the development process in the face of adversity, thus losing the opportunity for further development.

Second, the development of an enterprise should be combined with the development of individuals, especially the development of the management of the enterprise. Enterprise development and personal development, especially management stagnation, will become an obstacle to the development of enterprises, while personal development will promote the development of enterprises. Enterprise and personal development should be a two-way co-development.

Third, in the process of fulfilling social responsibility, enterprises should also pay attention to the development of their own resource–information linkage capabilities and systems thinking capabilities, so as to improve organizational resilience. At present, many entrepreneurs only regard the fulfillment of strategic CSR as part of corporate conscience, but ignore the long-term benefits it brings to the survival and development of enterprises: on the one hand, establishing stable and close cooperative relationships with stakeholders and strengthening the position of enterprises in the social network can help enterprises disperse their own risks and obtain external resources in a crisis environment; on the other hand, the enhancement of innovation capacity is conducive to enterprises and their rapid adaptation to external environmental changes, enhancing the competitive advantage of enterprises in a dynamic environment and achieving sustainable development.

6.3. Research Limitations and Future Prospects

This paper has carried out a systematic analysis of New Oriental, a typical enterprise, to derive the influencing factors of organizational resilience, and has made a typical analysis and useful exploration on the New Oriental case to draw some valuable conclusions. However, this paper also has the following problems:

First, the case in this paper is from New Oriental in the education industry, which has more focus on values and social responsibility than other industries, and needs further exploration on whether the impact of social responsibility and values in organizational resilience is applicable to more general industries.

Secondly, organizational resilience plays an important role in the growth process of enterprises. However, there might be a “dark side” to resilience, such as the overconfidence and self-depletion caused by resilience [28]. This aspect has not been discussed in the current study, and future research can further explore the potential negative effects of resilience.