We detail the ways in which Wells Fargo used the tenets of the discourse of renewal and resilience communication to respond to its financial crises. To do so, we completed a thematic analysis of Well Fargo’s website and commercials. Specifically, we found that Wells Fargo relied on its organizational history to communicate renewal. In doing, so Wells Fargo (1) created a paradoxical timeline of events that puts alternative logic to work and (2) drew on established identity anchors. We therefore conclude that discourse of renewal can integrate past-orientation and address organizational identity work with theoretical basis. By combining these two frameworks and applying them to a real-world crisis context, we make important contributions to the continued development of both the discourse of renewal and resilience communication.

Resilience is an ongoing sensemaking process that relies on communicative interactions -including those that occur between stakeholders and organizations -in order to understand and respond to a given adversity. Resilience communication is enacted through discursive processes that align with the tenets of fully functioning society theory (FFS). In order to integrate these two theoretical frameworks, we completed a qualitative content analysis of AARP's #DisruptAging campaign. In doing so, we found that the campaign provided information about age/aging in a way that countered commonly held stereotypes about older adults at multiple-levels (e.g., individual, organizational, societal). The processes of resilience were reflected in the organizational discourse, as was a new strategy -acceptance/appreciation. These findings illuminate the societal role of organizational discourse by showing how inclusive organizational-public communication can disrupt metanarratives and enrich the marketplace of ideas, and thus contribute to the building of a fully functioning society through (re)constructing the meanings of resilience on individual, organizational, and societal levels.

No abstract