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Abstract

Background: Organizational resilience has become an essential capacity of government agencies working under conditions of increasing volatility, uncertainty, and complex systemic problems in their mission to maintain service delivery and institutional integrity. Purpose: The study is part of the doctoral thesis on capacity assessment of a public sector entity. The aim of the study is to provide a thorough narrative synthesis to explore the role of structured change management in advancing and enhancing organizational resilience in the context of the public institutions. Methodology: A narrative synthesis of literature was performed to study 84 academic sources that were peer-reviewed articles published within 2000-2024. Literature was chosen in reference to the relevance of its content to change initiatives in the public sector and resilience-building. Thematic synthesis methodology has been used in determining the significant conceptual empirical patterns of various disciplines such as public administration, management science, and organizational behavior. Results: The synthesis identified the thematic areas critical in which change management contributes to organizational resilience. Along with these synergies, the review also found gaps which include a lack of conceptual frameworks or lack of understanding of imagined complexities, paucity of empirical studies in developing economies and paucity of longitudinal studies to test the effects of change on resilience. Conclusion: The research findings reiterate the importance of change management, which is strategically planned and contextually supported, as an important enabler of resilience in a public sector. Nontheless, achieving this potential necessitates a shift away from episodic change initiatives, towards a permanent and institutionalized way of adapting and changing. Implications: The research will be beneficial to policy makers and institutional leaders as well as reform agents who would wish to enhance resilience in the public sector. It requires the concept of change management to be integrated within the main processes of governance.