Organizational Action During a Pandemic : An inductive research study

Abstract: The ongoing pandemic has brought uncertainty to the Swedish market by a sudden demand drop. Simultaneously, management literature describes the importance of adaption to a changing environment for future organizational survival. Therefore, this paper explores how Swedish organizations, owned by a controlling shareholder, acted during the ongoing pandemic. An inductive content analysis was made on quarterly reports by focusing on financial- and supply chain-actions taken as countermeasures to the ongoing crisis. Firstly, findings showed that the selection acted in response to the demand drop. Secondly, a broad arsenal of short-termed financial countermeasures was executed in the affected organizations, and long-termed, in the cyclical consumer sector. Lastly, even if the selection communicated issues in their supply chains, close to no countermeasures were communicated in this area.