Abstract

The global COVID-19 pandemic ushered multiple socio-political and economic crises for organisations and society. This situation has led to a scholarly spike in the crisis literature focusing on different types of organisational challenges. Most often, the recommendation suggested is for organisations to adopt a financial approach to resolve their constraints. This approach has led to an even bigger, unresolved problem of how organisations manage crisis situations that threaten their internal and external levels of operation and organisations’ capabilities to do so. Drawing from the SMEs-in-Crisis literature, it is argued how Teece’s (1997), and Eisendhardt ant Martin’s (2000) Dynamic Capabilities can provide the theoretical platform of how organisations’ capabilities and their readiness to tackle crisis-type disruptions are addressed. Six capability constructs have been developed from the analysis of the capabilities literature to form this conceptual paper’s main contribution and is referred to as a ‘Dynamic Capabilities Approach’ to crisis-change. The aspects make a valuable contribution to how businesses can enhance their internal and external readiness for further disruptive change and thereby boost their sustainability. Implications of the study’s findings, contributions and future research trajectories are considered.