Managing the COVID-19 emergency: A coordination framework to enhance response practices and actions

The global outbreak of the coronavirus pneumonia (COVID-19) showed how epidemics today can spread very rapidly, with potentially ruinous impact on economies and societies. Whereas medical research is crucial to define effective treatment protocols, technology innovation and social research can contribute by defining effective approaches to emergency management, especially to optimize the complex dynamics arising within actors and systems during the outbreak. The purpose of this article is to define a framework for modeling activities, actors and resources coordination in the epidemic management scenario, and to reflect on its use to enhance response practices and actions. We identify 25 types of resources and 8 activities involved in the management of epidemic, and study 29 “flow”, “fit”, and “share” dependencies among those resources and activities, along with purposeful management criteria. Next, we use a coordination framework to conceptualize an emergency management system encompassing practices and response actions. This study has the potential to impact a broad audience, and can opens avenues for follow up works at the intersection between technology and innovation management and societal challenges. The outcomes can have immediate applicability to an ongoing societal problem, as well as be generalized for application in future (possible although undesired) events.