Temporary organizations as a strategic repositioning in response to grand challenges

Purpose Are temporary organizations led by public-private partnership projects more likely to strengthen business and societal resilience in the face of major challenges? We present open innovation practices as a force for business and societal resilience in the context of PPPs. Design/methodology/approach We hypothesize and find robust evidence for a positive relationship between open innovation practices and business and societal resilience in a sample of professionals involved in PPP project management in highway transportation infrastructure in an emerging economy – in this case, Brazil, in the post-COVID-19 pandemic period (new normal). Findings Our findings contribute to the conversation on the role of PPPs in the face of major challenges such as the COVID-19 pandemic. As PPPs gain strength, our study offers a timely warning about the strength of open innovation practices and business and societal resilience in disruptive environments. Research limitations/implications We invite future researchers to empirically unpack our research framework by drawing samples of temporary organizations (e.g. PPPs) from other emerging and mature economies with a focus on generating innovative solutions to build business resilience and for the affected society in terms of justice and inclusion. Practical implications Our findings shed light on policymakers’ innovative solutions to infrastructure problems affected by disruptions and highlight PPP projects as a strategic repositioning in response to the disruption caused by the COVID-19 pandemic while strengthening societal and business resilience. Social implications Our findings prove to be robust across a range of analyses, and we show that open innovation can unlock the implementation and management of PPP projects to build transport infrastructure and build more equitable and inclusive future resilience for communities and their businesses. Originality/value The unique contribution of this paper is to empirically test how business and social resilience can be strengthened by implementing temporary organizations (e.g. PPP projects) under the lens of grand challenges.