The key factors of SMEs' resilience based on organisational behaviour theory

The global economic crisis and Covid-19 pandemic has increased turbulence and uncertainties in business environment, as a result Small and medium enterprises (SMEs) are facing more challenges. However, there remain open questions, how SMEs cope, survive and develop strategies that orchestrate resilience during these times. Using a sample of 3355 SMEs management configuration systems from European Union, the study explores how SMEs resiliently prevailed during 2008 financial crisis and decade onwards. The study, considered Return on equity (ROE) ratio as a measure of resilience, explore the association of SMEs´ dynamic managerial capabilities, test the significance of management configurations, and propose an innovative framework that aims to improve competitiveness. The research demonstrated that top management configurations coupled with human resource management (HRM) could promote resilient performance during crisis and uncertain business environment. In addition, the study offers choices on management configuration to decision makers, highlights the research limitations and future studies.