Financial Resilience Trajectories and Adaptive Strategies of Korean Human Service Organizations (HSOs) During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Beyond Reliance on Government Subsidies for Private Sector Support

This study examines how Korean Human Service Organizations (HSOs) achieved financial resilience during COVID-19 through a sequential mixed-methods design. Despite stable government subsidies, HSOs faced declining private support, prompting adaptive financial strategies. Using Generalized Mixture Modeling (GMM, 2017–2020, N = 205), four resilience trajectories were identified: Adaptive Recovery, Absorptive Stability, Vulnerability, and Limited Capacity. Among these, two financially resilient patterns – Adaptive Recovery (reversing prior declines) and Absorptive Stability (maintaining stability) – highlighted organizations that sustained or increased private support amid crisis. Complementary qualitative analysis of 30 resilient HSOs revealed three enabling factors: strategic resource mobilization, mission-driven stakeholder collaboration, and adaptive leadership. These results demonstrate that resilient HSOs actively combined resource diversification, stakeholder engagement, and leadership adaptation to secure private support and sustain services. The study contributes to nonprofit resilience literature by offering context-specific insights into dual-funded organizations’ adaptive capacities and informing future crisis-preparedness strategies for human service systems.