Ambidextrous leadership and innovation performance: a longitudinal study

Abstract

PurposeThe ambidextrous leadership model specifically describes opening and closing leader behaviors in the innovation process. This paper aims to emphasize the relevance of the ambidextrous leadership model with respect to leadership in innovation processes.Design/methodology/approachIn this longitudinal research design, 54 employees rated the ambidextrous leader behaviors and innovation performance concerning an innovation project over a period of six weeks. Traditional leadership styles (i.e. transformational, transactional, instrumental leadership, leader–member exchange) were assessed at a between-person level to identify their effects with respect to innovation performance.FindingsMultilevel regression analysis results showed that instrumental leadership as well as opening and closing leader behaviors were positively related to innovation performance. By contrast, transformational and transactional leadership as well as leader–member exchange (LMX) did not show significant associations with innovation performance.Originality/valueThe findings support the relevance of specific leader behaviors to the innovation process and therefore underline the importance of the ambidextrous leadership model.

Aligning Leader Behaviors With Innovation Requirements Improves Performance: An Experimental Study

“…Finally, future research needs to focus more specifically on antecedents and consequences of opening and closing leader behaviors in comparison to other leadership approaches. For instance, even though studies, like the present one, show that ambidextrous leadership explain variance above transformational and transactional leadership (Zacher and Rosing, 2015;Zacher et al, 2016;Gerlach et al, 2020), high correlations among the constructs point to a relatedness that needs to be further explored (Rosing et al, 2011). Specifically, future research needs to examine the nomological net of ambidextrous leadership in field studies.…”

“…In general, relationships of traditional leadership approaches with innovation outcomes vary widely (Rosing et al, 2011;Hughes et al, 2018). We suggest that this variation is due to not explicitly considering the distinct requirements of creativity and implementation that are both inherent to the innovation process (Hunter et al, 2011;Rosing et al, 2011;Gerlach et al, 2020). Thus, these models overlook the necessity to align leader behavior with situational demands of the innovation task, a suggestion that goes back to contingency models of leadership (Fiedler, 1971;Peters et al, 1985) that has not been explicitly included in research on leadership and innovation.…”

“…Specifically, future research needs to examine the nomological net of ambidextrous leadership in field studies. To date, studies examining the relative predictive validity of different leadership approaches (including ambidextrous leadership) are rare (Hughes et al, 2018;Gerlach et al, 2020). However, these studies are important to differentiate which leadership models and behaviors are most effective (Hughes et al, 2018).…”

“…However, these studies are important to differentiate which leadership models and behaviors are most effective (Hughes et al, 2018). This is especially relevant for the complex innovation process (Rosing et al, 2011;Hughes et al, 2018;Gerlach et al, 2020).…”

Ambidextrous leadership: opening and closing leader behaviours to facilitate idea generation, idea promotion and idea realization

“…For example, in a survey study amongst employees, Zacher et al (2016) found that the extent to which employees perceived opening and closing leader behaviours predicted self-reported opening and closing employee behaviours respectively, and that the interaction of opening and closing behaviours predicted employee innovative performance. In a more recent longitudinal study, Gerlach, Hundeling et al (2020) found that innovative performance was positively predicted by both opening and closing behaviours (but not their interaction). Thus, there appears to be considerable empirical support for the main tenet of ambidextrous leadership theory.…”