Organizational resilience in the oil and gas industry: A scoping review

Abstract

Resilience derives from the study of socio-ecological systems and refers to the dynamical capacity to adapt to internal and external perturbations by changing its mode of operation without losing its ability to perform. The present article offers a scoping review of organizational research discussing the concept of resilience in the oil and gas industry. Rather than approaching a narrowly defined question as in systematic reviews, scoping reviews produce an overview of a body of knowledge covering broad questions. It reviews organizational research on resilience in the oil and gas industry by covering five main categories: conceptualizations; article type/methods; context/unit of analysis; relation between resilience and safety; and, central topics highlighted in the literature. The review of both empirical and conceptual literature reveals that the concept of resilience tends to be researched in terms of system capabilities or outcomes rather than processes. Integrated operations has provided new scenarios to discuss and investigate resilience in oil and gas production. However, findings demonstrate how resilience is often presented as a normative construct and there is little development in terms of understanding the dynamics of adaptive processes in the industry. The overall goal is to contribute to the study of organizational resilience by identifying areas for further study and by producing new knowledge that can permeate practices in organizations.