Measuring regional business resilience

Abstract

The concept of regional resilience is explored by understanding the resilience of individual firms within both the region (and their capabilities to cope, adapt and reconfigure) and a constantly evolving economic environment. This study examines the utility of the QuiScore credit indicator (from the Financial Analysis Made Easy (FAME) database) to measure both firm and regional economic resilience. Using the Cardiff Capital Region in Wales, UK (for the period 2006-16) as a case study, the results indicate that the QuiScore is an effective indicator of the economic resilience of firms as well as an early warning indicator of economic stresses for a region.

The geographical impact of the Covid-19 crisis on precautionary savings, firm survival and jobs: Evidence from the United Kingdom’s 100 largest towns and cities

“…Notwithstanding this, prior evidence suggests that the smallest firms are disproportionately affected by chronic uncertainty due to lower resilience levels to unexpected shocks (Williams and Vorley, 2017). For example, a recent study examined credit scores in SMEs to assess firm resilience during the post-GFC period which showed firm closure was often precipitated by falling credit scores in the years prior to foreclosure (Soroka et al, 2020). Indeed, while there is limited evidence regarding resilience in SMEs (Wishart, 2018), it has been vividly illustrated that entrepreneurship is central to creating more resilient regional economies (Williams and Vorley, 2014).…”

Resilience building in service firms during and post COVID-19

“…Most of the previous studies on sectoral or regional business focused on the manufacturing industry (e.g. Fromhold-Eisebith, 2015;Soroka et al, 2020), thus, there is a need for research on the service industry. Moreover, future studies may examine the service firms that adopted one or more of the resilience-building strategies during and after the pandemic and assess the effect of these strategies on their survival and growth rates.…”

Shocks, uncertainty and regional resilience: The case of Brexit and Scottish SMEs

“…A number of studies have also examined the impact on regional resilience generated by the shock of the GFC (Dijkstra et al., 2015; Giannakis and Bruggeman, 2017). An interesting recent study assessed credit scores to assess firm resilience during the post-GFC period (Soroka et al., 2020). This showed firm closure was often precipitated by falling credit scores in the years prior to foreclosure.…”

“…In other words, not all firms are equally resilient when faced by destabilising shocks. Therefore, there seems ‘good reason’ to argue that a fuller conceptualisation of regional resilience must incorporate ‘an understanding of the resilience of individual firms and their specific capacities to cope with, adapt to and reconfigure their technological, network and organizational structures within a constantly evolving economic environment’ (Soroka et al., 2020: 3). Given their crucial importance to modern day economies, SMEs may be a suitable ‘unit of analysis’ and a powerful barometer for measuring regional resilience.…”

“…Yet, to date, how different types of regions and firms cope, adjust and adapt to unforeseen shocks such as Brexit and its related uncertainty has been largely under-researched. Therefore, following pleas for more ‘agency’ and ‘firm-centred’ approaches towards analysing regional resilience (Bristow and Healy, 2014; Dawley et al., 2010; Soroka et al., 2020), this article empirically scrutinizes the impact of Brexit on Scottish SMEs.…”