Thriving Together : How Regenerative Firms Can Build Collectively a Stronger Future

Abstract: Motivation In the upcoming decades, traditional firms will transition to becoming a more regenerative version, with a socio-ecological purpose at the core of the firm. In this transition phase, regenerative firms, with a focus on impact maximisation of the socio-ecological purpose and traditional firms, with a focus rather on profit maximisation, need to coexist and be resilient somehow. While in the coming decades the number of regenerative firms will grow, it is important to understand how these regenerative firms can enable organisational resilience. Yet, prior research neglects how especially inter-organisational collaboration could enhance the organisational resilience of regenerative firms. Therefore, the context of this study is within the consumer goods industry in the Netherlands and the United Kingdom, focusing on regenerative firms. Purpose This study aims to shed light on how inter-organisational collaboration can strengthen the organisational resilience of regenerative firms. The first part of the research will mostly address the question how regenerative firms can strengthen organisational resilience with a focus on the capabilities needed. In addition, the study will demonstrate how regenerative firms approach and use inter-organisational collaboration. Methodology The study, with a qualitative approach, used a multi-case study design. Various people were interviewed, such as CEOs, founders, quality managers, consultants, impact officers, following a semi-structured interview design. For transcription purposes, the interviews were audio-recorded and the results from the interviews were labelled, following an open coding process. The results, with matching open codes, were then connected back to the theoretical framework. Results The results of this study indicated how inter-organisational collaboration is used to strengthen the organisational resilience of regenerative firms. Contradicting prior research about traditional firms, regenerative firms do not fear competition, yet these firms rather achieve system resilience by being resilient as a collective. Regenerative firms realise this by being transparent, absorbing and sharing knowledge to achieve success for the system they are embedded in. Sharing knowledge in a transparent manner and aiming for reciprocity among inter-organisational collaboration actors contributes positively to their system resilience. Thus, inter-organisational collaboration is a powerful tool for regenerative firms to enhance this system resilience and consequently maximising the impact of their collective socio-ecological purpose.