Title: Fostering individual-level ambidexterity in SMEs: a relational-contract perspective on informal external drivers of employees' ambidextrous behaviour

Authors: J-Michael Gasda; Urs Fueglistaller

Addresses: Swiss Research Institute for Small Business and Entrepreneurship, University of St. Gallen, Dufourstrasse 40a, CH-9000 St. Gallen, Switzerland ' Swiss Research Institute for Small Business and Entrepreneurship, University of St. Gallen, Dufourstrasse 40a, CH-9000 St. Gallen, Switzerland

Abstract: We contribute to a conceptual understanding of how SME managers can efficiently influence their employees' exploration-exploitation activities or, in other words, how they can foster individual-level ambidexterity, which arises in SMEs when exploration and exploitation activities are balanced. We adopt a relational-contract perspective to discuss informal external drivers of employees ambidexterity. More specifically, we draw on social-learning theory to analyse how managers' ambidextrous behaviours might enable employees' exploration-exploitation activities. We suggest that it is important for SME managers to serve as role models of ambidextrous behaviour in order to foster non-managerial employees' ambidexterity. Furthermore, we draw on rational-choice and social-exchange conceptualisations of employee-manager exchange to analyse the influence of extrinsic motivators on employees' exploration-exploitation activities. Top-down social processes of learning and employee-manager exchange might together constitute relational contracts between managers and employees. We suggest that such contracts can efficiently foster employee-level ambidexterity as they combine relational with transactional elements by enabling social learning via managers' exploration-exploitation role models and aligning employees' interests with those of the organisation via social exchanges. As the social processes behind relational contracts cannot be easily copied, we argue that employees' ambidexterity facilitates the emergence of sustained competitive advantages.

Keywords: ambidexterity; strategic entrepreneurship; relational contracts; corporate entrepreneurship; entrepreneurial behaviour; small and medium-sized enterprises; SMEs; informal drivers; external drivers; employee behaviour; ambidextrous behaviour; exploration; exploitation; social learning theory; rational choice; social exchange; employee-manager exchange; extrinsic motivation.

DOI: 10.1504/IJEV.2016.078963

International Journal of Entrepreneurial Venturing, 2016 Vol.8 No.3, pp.217 - 236

Received: 07 Sep 2013
Accepted: 14 Sep 2014
Published online: 08 Sep 2016 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article