Disaster management: Recognizing opportunities during and post crises.

Disasters are unexpected external factors that create major shifts in organizational landscapes that create industry- and community-wide threats; however, the recovery period offers opportunities for entrepreneurial firms as well. In this paper, we investigate impacts of disasters, stakeholders' roles, and entrepreneur's strategic decisions as they identify opportunities and try to survive during difficult times. We theorize that disasters, although negative in many regards, disrupt markets and may spur entrepreneurial activity. Moreover, we suggest that strategic decision-making processes become faster, more centralized, and more flexible and that geographical-cluster membership has important advantages based on increased cooperation between stakeholders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]