Creativity as the Ultimate Asset in the COVID-19 Reconfigured Organizational Environment

Introduction

As of the year 2020, the world has been challenged with the wide-ranging impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic (George et al., 2020). We have been assisting to a reconfiguration of the worldwide dynamics into paths never imagined because as of that year we have been assisting to a phenomenon of global scale which crystalized into the translation of a health crisis into an economic, financial, and social one.

The truth is that the economic world as we know has faced a clear and profound redefinition, marked by deep transformations and creative solutions to the refined dynamics it faced. It is possible to point out that the widespread geographical proliferation of the virus stimulated social distancing as both a public health need, but also as a subsequent daily habit, which has ended up by conducting to the shutdown of businesses, events, and corporate offices, henceforth, notably affording negative consequences on the so far fueled undercurrents on the global financial markets. Not disregarding this economic impact of the Coronavirus, we can derive a second vector to explain its imprint on the renewed organizational subtleties, if we acknowledge the exponential rate at which the virus had been spreading, and for sure as well the delicate and sharp uncertainty on its current and future situation. This way, we can argue that it climaxed into a generalized feeling of constant panic by the worldwide population, by which people had been impelled to design and adopt safe and preventive habits not only in their daily routines (and in those, we stress their work dynamics) but also in their overall patterns of consumption and investment. And this alteration is assumed as wide-ranging not only in its geographical scope, but also on the actors it impacted, given that both consumers, investors, international trade partners, employers, and employees have been profoundly affected.

Based on the above mentioned, it is possible to defend that, whereas this pandemic has undeniably and profoundly tested the solidity, agility, and resilience of organizations, it as well keeps stressing the urgency of a refined academic debate and reviewed managerial approaches in what concerns to the core assumptions fundamental to the conceptual frameworks that have traditionally been guiding the managerial decisions, corporate structural configurations, and organizational policies and practices, and this based on the premise that, with this new global context, both new-fangled problems and challenges arose, nevertheless, as well revigorated opportunities have been afforded to the organizational environment, in both professional and personal spheres affecting its overall stakeholders.

Henceforth, the present chapter assumes both academic and managerial relevance, based on the argument (as already exposed) that it is consensual that, in recent times, the world has been experiencing uncertain and turbulent environmental conditions, which impact the financial, economic, social, and political scopes. As so, the worldwide complex interdependencies have been stressfully challenged with increased competition, shortages on the demand on certain products/services and economic sectors, constraints on the supply of certain goods and services, volatile dynamics on pricing, and unpredictable technological changes, coupled and worsened with the Covid-19 pandemic. This to say, the present chapter aims at providing not only a review and exposition around the consequences this pandemic has addressed to the sustainability of businesses but, and subsequently, it aims as well at providing useful insights on which assets have assumed with amplified significance as a means to strengthen organizational resilience to overcome those reconfigured challenges, this way highlighting Creativity as the ultimate organizational asset to strive on this new-fangled global corporate environment. This also to say, stressing the relevance of Creativity as the ultimate organizational asset to boost organizational performance, premise that we sustain to have gain momentum and fundament in the current world, due to the twofold challenges and opportunities brought about by the worldwide impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic on the corporate level.