Understanding Organization Change and Innovation: A Conversation with Mike Tushman

Antecedents enabling team ambidexterity: moving beyond mere microfoundation

Purpose

Ambidexterity in teams represents powerful dynamic capabilities for innovation and adaptation in rapidly changing environments. This study focused on the emerging concept of team ambidexterity. Primary purposes were to consolidate emerging research on ambidexterity within teams and to synthesise antecedent inputs.

Design/methodology/approach

This study applied a systematic content-based review method to collect articles relevant to enabling ambidexterity within teams. The study integrated relevant studies on ambidexterity and on teams and teamwork. It analysed content through theoretical frameworks of ambidexterity and dynamic capabilities.

Findings

Team ambidexterity constitutes a distinct and increasingly important organisational concept beyond just supporting firm-level ambidexterity. Team ambidexterity depends on inputs that can include ambidexterity's multilevel, generic mechanisms and additional team-centric inputs specially characterising teams.

Practical implications

Organisational leaders need insights into the valuable potential of ambidextrous teams that can increase innovation and enable successful adaptation at an operational level for longterm survival and competitive advantage in volatile environments. The study highlights the essential inputs for designing and equipping ambidextrous teams.

Originality/value

Team ambidexterity research is growing, but so far it has mostly addressed team ambidexterity as a microfoundation supporting firm-level ambidexterity. Existing studies have remained mostly disparate and unorganized. This study appears unique in having identified and synthesised studies most relevant to developing ambidexterity within teams. The study articulated a more comprehensive understanding of team ambidexterity, derived a novel set of team-centric inputs and analysed ambidexterity as dynamic capabilities at operational unit level.

Academia a new knowledge supplier to the industry! Uncovering barriers in the process

Purpose

In the era of Industry 4.0, knowledge component plays a vital role in manufacturing. For tacking the new complexities of the business, a concept of knowledge supply chain (KSC) is being proposed, which takes into account of knowledge component. Higher education institutes (HEIs) which are primary creator of knowledge are important foundations of such supply chain and act as the “knowledge supplier.” The purpose of this paper is to focus on why the HEIs are failed to become knowledge supplier in developing country like India.

Design/methodology/approach

This research paper adopts a resource-based theory to explore the concept and identify barriers which obstructs the progress of HEIs to become prominent knowledge supplier to industry. To tackle the research problem, an integrated hybrid approach of interpretive structural modeling–analytic hierarchy process is used. Expert elicitation was engaged to find out the prominence of each barrier and the interrelations among them.

Findings

Based on literature review, eight critical barriers were recognized. The findings put forward a four layer structural model. Based on this model, various remedial actions are also suggested to eliminate the barriers or lessen their negative effects on KSC.

Practical implications

This study finds its practical implication in higher education reforms as the identified barriers could enhance the decision-making quality regarding academia–industry interaction.

Social implications

Using the results of the study, HEIs could improve their social sustainability as they have different stakeholders covering wider sections of society and one being industry.

Originality/value

Most of the existing studies talk about short-term interactions like technology transfer. This study takes into account the barriers which are acting as roadblocks in long-term knowledge supplying role of HEIs.