Constituting absence as reliability: The case of COVID‐19 response networks

Abstract

AbstractHigh reliability organizations (HROs) are rare organizations that manage established technologies to avoid catastrophic errors. The concept of reliability, however, has become attractive to other organization types. This expansion creates scholarly questions about what reliability is outside of HROs. The COVID‐19 pandemic challenged new organizations to create reliability by also creating alternative meanings and practices of reliability that could adequately address an unknown, evolving health threat. This study draws on semistructured interviews and virtual ethnography during the first year of the COVID‐19 pandemic to examine how organizations communicatively defined reliability. The study finds that organizations engage in datafication of hazards to demonstrate they are performing reliably and proposes the practice of “evidencing reliability” as an important step in constituting reliability. However, datafication of hazards can also lead to skewed understandings of organizational performance and potential success biases.