Situational control and New Zealand SMEs’ strategic responses during a global supply chain disruption

Motivated by the global impact of COVID-19 on supply chains and the lack of understanding of supply chain resilience from an SME exporter perspective in the international business literature, this paper sets out to explore how New Zealand SME exporters achieve resilience during the pandemic. The study adopts a qualitative, multiple case studies approach to identify the key strategic drivers and contextual factors influencing supply chain resilience. We offer a nuanced understanding of three strategic choices during a global supply chain disruption: buffer, bridging and mixed strategies. Our study is guided by resource dependence theory and information processing theory; our study places exporters' situational control in the center of drivers to firms' strategic responses. We make a novel attempt to incorporate the contextual conditions of the COVID-19 pandemic into the theorization of supply chain resilience. We make managerial recommendations to help SME exporters navigate global supply chain disruption challenges.