Abstract:

Organisations must adapt to and manage complex, unpredictable situations, which highlights the need for understanding resilient competencies. Traditional research has often overlooked the uncertainty and unpredictability of such events, and how organisations can achieve resilience. More studies are therefore needed to explore the complex nature of unforeseen events and the types of resilience competencies necessary for preparedness. This paper aims to help educators, leaders and organisations effectively prepare for and handle unforeseen events. The research had two main objectives: to explore the nature of unforeseen events and to identify competencies at individual, social, and organisational levels that enhance education and preparedness. Data was collected from 2016 to 2019 using a mixed-methods sequential explanatory design, involving both quantitative and qualitative phases. The quantitative research collected data from 917 Norwegian Armed Forces personnel through a self-completion questionnaire (UN-MET validated question battery), achieving an 87% response rate. The sample included 795 men and 114 women, with an average age of 28.1 years and 6.6 years of professional experience. The qualitative approach, deep-interviewing 13 Norwegian experts with extensive cross-sectorial experience in unforeseen events (a.o. health service, energy industry, police, and fire service). The participants had an average age of 48.9 years and 29.9 years of professional experience. The findings suggest that preparing for and responding to unforeseen events can be improved by enhancing social and relational factors. The quantitative studies showed that interaction, general self-efficacy, and social support significantly predicted preparedness for unforeseen events, accounting for 41% of the variance. The studies also proposed that organisations should combine traditional emergency preparedness measures with social support, concurrent learning, decision-making in dilemmas, improvisation, and flexibility. The qualitative study reinforced these findings, highlighting the importance of self-efficacy, social support, and interaction in resilience. The research suggests that traditional preparedness measures should be complemented by focusing on emotional factors, self-efficacy, social support, interaction, concurrent learning, improvisation, and flexibility. Developing these competencies can help organisations remain sustainable and adaptable in the face of unforeseen events. Based on the findings, a practical strategic competence structure model (SCS) is introduced, which can support personnel managers, educators, scenario builders for training and exercises, and others responsible for the education and training of personnel who must deal with unforeseen events. The findings will also be relevant for teacher and health education, both in connection with the growing need for competence in emergency preparedness in schools and higher education, and also for dealing with unforeseen events in teaching situations. The findings therefore also have didactic implications. This model can also form the basis for further empiric research to develop a multilevel, cross-disciplinary approach to understanding and preparing for unforeseen events, improving measurement tools, and identifying specific learning processes and competencies.

Keywords:

The Unforeseen, competence, training, learning, preparedness, unforeseen methodology.