ABSTRACT
Disruptive changes, such as the ones caused by the COVID-19 outbreak, oblige firms to develop the ability to be resilient in this unstable environment if they want to stay competitive. In this context, the aim of this article is to unveil how intellectual capital (IC) may foster resilience in small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). To serve this purpose, this article presents the results of a qualitative analysis of two SMEs during the COVID-19 pandemic. The most significant evidence is that a combination of the components of IC, namely human capital, organisational capital, and relational capital, is useful for SMEs to respond to changing conditions and take advantage of emergent opportunities, which means going through the prepare-respond-transform resilience process. This article is among the first attempting to elucidate the relationship between IC and SME resilience. It reveals a tight connection between these two concepts, which still deserves further investigation. © 2022 The Operational Research Society.