Antecedents to ambidexterity competency in high technology organizations

Aravind Chandrasekaran, Kevin Linderman, Roger Schroeder

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

182 Scopus citations

Abstract

High tech organizations confront dual demands of exploring new products/processes and exploiting existing products/processes. Research shows that ambidextrous organizations can better manage these dual demands, but our understanding of the antecedents that lead to ambidexterity is still emerging. In addition, previous research has taken a piecemeal approach to understand ambidexterity and does not fully consider its multilevel nature. This research takes a multilevel perspective and argues that a competency in ambidexterity involves three capabilities at different organizational levels: decision risk (strategic level), structural differentiation (project level), and contextual alignment (meso level). After correcting for endogeneity we empirically examine the relationship between these antecedents and ambidexterity competency by collecting multi-level data from 34 high tech business units and 110 exploration and exploitation R&D projects. The results indicate that decision risk and contextual alignment affect ambidexterity competency for high tech organizations. Structural differentiation does not affect ambidexterity competency but has mixed effects on R&D project performance.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)134-151
Number of pages18
JournalJournal of Operations Management
Volume30
Issue number1-2
DOIs
StatePublished - Jan 2012

All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes

  • Strategy and Management
  • Management Science and Operations Research
  • Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Antecedents to ambidexterity competency in high technology organizations'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this