Msc Strategic Management

The copyright of the Master thesis rests with the author. The author is responsible for its contents. RSI Erasmus University is only responsible for the educational coaching and beyond that can non be held responsible for the content.Acknowledgements I would like to thank Raymond caravan Wick, Bert Flier, and Justine Jansen for their inspirational lectures and papers forming the basis for my thesis and new constitute interests Raymond van Will and Mochala Chippers for thoughtful discussion and feedback during the process of piece of writing this thesis the managers responding to my river for enabling thesis testing my p arnts, sister, and brother for their enduring and limitless support and patience and XX for her support, love, and understanding.Your valuable contri yetions enabled the writing of this paper. XX, March 2009 Marten van Brussels Designing ambidextrousness Social Capital and Ambidexterity 10 Cognitive genial outstanding 11 Shared enculturation and systems Shared slew 12 Relational social capital 13 Trust Tie strength 14 Ambidexterity and Unit PerformanceIt provides the scheme the ability to be align with and adaptable to its environment. The ambidextrous organizational form builds on internally inconsistent structures and closes, allowing wildcat and exploitative unit of measurements to optimally configure themselves around specialised task-environment requirements. Exploratory units assay for new knowledge and skills for the development of radical innovations and are characterized by loose cultures.Exploitative units build on and extend existing knowledge and skills for making incremental changes and amusement park well with tight cultures. Thus, to achieve ambidextrousness organizations have to integrate the contradictory forces of geographic expedition and exploitation and manage the internal tensions hat these forces bring along. However, it is strategic integration which remains to be a complex issue. The mechanisms for int egration need to be able to access and integrate knowledge across relatively autonomous units.Till date, buckram integration mechanisms have received ample attention, while organizational social capital was largely ignored. Cognitive and comparative social capital are found to be essential de terminationinants for the transfer of knowledge between units within the organization and thus for their integration. Therefore, this study explores how cognitive social UAPITA, represented by divided culture and systems and shared vision, provides the needed meaning and understanding for business units in a context of contradiction which is apparent in the ambidextrous organizational form.In addition, the facets of relational social capital, represented by assumption and strong ties, are explored as enablers to bringing units focusing on either exploratory or exploitative activities together. In gist 52 autonomous business units, from three globally diversified electronics and electrical equipment companies, participated with the research through surveys. These business units are responsible for either a specific market segment or product group, ranging from more traditional businesses to newer businesses.They provided insight into their achievement of ambidexterity, motion, the close of mutual meaning and understanding with other units, and the content of their relations with other units. The results concerning the four separated factors used to measure cognitive and relational social capital appear to be kneadd by invisible multimillionaires. However, these factors still let off to considerable extent the achievement of business unit ambidexterity and reference.Concerning cognitive social capital, a shared culture and systems do not appear to influence the achievement of ambidexterity, while a shared vision among business units strongly supports business unit ambidexterity and to considerable extent performance. Concerning relational social capital, trust betw een business units seems to contribute to ambidexterity, but a shared vision is an important contributor to this relationship. Trust also positively influences unit performance.Strong ties do not seem to influence the simultaneous pursuit for exploratory and exploitative innovation. If at all, the relation would have been negative. Before strong ties would benefit ambidexterity, these ties need to be complemented by a certain amount of trust. In addition, strong ties do not support unit performance. The findings indicate that a combination of shared culture and systems and shared vision into a single measure of cognitive social capital does explain business unit ambidexterity and to considerable extent unit performance.The manduction of a vision amongst separated business units appears to reduce the negative effects of resistance to change and adaptability following from a shared culture and systems. By combine shared vision and shared culture and systems it seems that a more bala nced understanding or context is created in which units accept the simultaneous pursuit of exploration and exploitation. The combination also positively impacts performance. A combination of trust and strong ties into a single measure of relational social capital does explain unit performance, and to some extent ambidexterity.It appears that trusting relations positively mediate the negative relation between strong ties and the search for novel ideas. While trust leads to the give-and-take and combination of rich resources, the implementation of the consequent novel insights and combinations is benefited by strong ties. The achievement of business unit ambidexterity does positively influence unit performance. However, ambidexterity does not seem to mediate the relation between social capital and performance. Rather the relation between social capital and unit performance is a direct one.Overall, social capital dimensions enable the integration of exploratory and exploitative activi ties, while ameliorating the subsequent internal tensions. In addition, the content of relations and extent of mutual understanding between business units influences unit performance. Hence, social capital is an important contributor to vital business unit outcomes. Top managers should therefore bounce back the creation and exploitation of social capital. Interesting avenues for future literature are discussed.Taken together, these understandings deliver new insights into how business units might achieve competitive advantages and increased performance and survival chances. 5 An organizations long-term survival depends on its ability to strike in enough exploitation to ensure the organizations current viability and to engage into enough exploration to ensure future viability (March, 1991 105). Indeed, Rakish & Brainwash (2008) in their effort to merge the burgeoned literature on organizational ambidexterity conclude that successful firms are ambidextrous.It provides the organizati on the ability to be aligned with and adaptable to their environment (Gibson & Brainwash, 2004), enables the organization to simultaneously pursue exploratory and exploitative innovations (Banner & Dustman, 2003), and gives it competitive advantage (Dustman & Reilly, 1996). To achieve organizational ambidexterity organizations have to unite the contradictory forces of exploration and exploitation and manage the internal tensions that these forces bring along.While the benefits of organizational ambidexterity have been emphasized and important contributions providing insight in how to accomplish organizational ambidexterity have been made (e. G. Jansen, George, Van den Busch, & Belabored, AAA Kittening & Dustman, 2007 smith & Dustman, 2005 He & Wong, 2004), empirical evidence explicating the factors underlying the process of achieving organizational ambidexterity is largely lacking (Reilly & Dustman, 2008 Jansen, et al, AAA). The ambidextrous organization thrives on internally incons istent structures and cultures (Smith & Dustman, 2005).Exploratory units search for new knowledge and skills for the development of radical innovations in put up to meet the needs of emerging customers or markets, while exploitative units build on and extend existing knowledge and skills for making incremental changes to existing products and go to meet the needs of existing customers and markets (Banner & Dustman, 2003). This focus enables the units to optimally configure themselves around specific discontentment requirements (Lawrence & Loras, 1967).However, it is the strategic integration of these contradictory forces which leads organizational ambidexterity to engender a dynamic capability for the organization (Reilly & Dustman, 2008). Since organizational ambidexterity appears to be such an important concept for organizations and difficult to achieve a lack in research on its antecedents is surprising. This paper focuses on the antecedents of ambidexterity at business unit l evel by taking on a social capital perspective.The research on managing and integrating exploratory and exploitative activities has mainly focused on formal structures and incentives, largely ignoring the social structure that likely enables organizational ambidexterity (Cleanable & Dustman, 2007 Jansen, Van den Busch, & Belabored, 2006). By focusing on cognitive social capital and relational social capital, the two dimensions of social capital that provide occlusion within the organization (Van Wick, Jansen, & Less, 2008), the paper attempts to explain the integration of exploratory and exploitative activities.The paper argues hat cognitive social capital, represented by shared culture and systems and shared vision, provides the needed meaning and understanding in the context of contradiction (Smith & Dustman, 2005 Inpatient & Shoal, 1998 Inept and Tsars, 2005 Van Wick, et al, 2008), which is apparent in the ambidextrous organizational form. The facets of relational social capital , represented by trust and strong ties, are seen as enablers to bringing units focusing on either exploratory or exploitative activities together (Van Wick, et al, 2008 Tsar, 2000).Also, social capital stands central o the understanding of innovation (Inpatient & Shoal, 1998 Moran, 2005) and as such influences exploratory and exploitative innovation. In addition, Guppy, Smith & Shelley (2006) state that learning from exploratory and exploitative activities is more likely to occur at macro level (I. E. Team, unit, organizational, or interdenominational), than at micro level (I. E. The individual).Thus, referring to the definition of social capital (Inept & Tsars, 2005), organizational learning is a resource which is embedded within, becomes available through, and can be derived from a network of relationships. Following this logic, organizational ambidexterity resides in the relationships between units, which are explained by social capital theory. By addressing the question how soci al capital can enable ambidexterity, the study attempts to bring a social perspective into the ambidexterity debate.Research addressing this link is missing, while the two are seemingly related. By studying the relation between social capital, which has the ability to build competitive advantage (Inpatient & Shoal, 1998), and ambidexterity, which leads to long-term survival (Rakish & Brainwash, 2008), this paper contributes mainly to the strategic management and organizational literature. In the following sections theory and hypotheses exit be presented. Ambidexterity and social capital will be explained, while the hypotheses and the research model linking the two are given.Then, the methodology section will outline how the study tests these hypotheses within business units. The results section provides sign insight on the fulfillment of the hypotheses, while their implications will be outlined in the discussion and conclusion section. In addition, the paper proposes future avenu es for inquiry. 7 Duncan (1976) introduced the term ambidexterity, in the organizational setting, arguing that long-term organizational success depends on switching organizational structures in sequence, depending on an organizations state of innovativeness.When an organization finds itself in a phase of innovation it should adopt an organic structure. When the organization is ready to exploit the innovation a mechanistic structure is more appropriate. However, it was not until the seminal term of March (1991) on organizational learning that research on ambidexterity started burgeoning. March (1991) argued that organizations should engage in enough exploitation to ensure the organizations current viability and engage in enough exploration to ensure future viability (March, 1991 105, italics added).A focus on exploitation at the expense of exploration is likely to lead to short-term success, but in the long-term may lead to competency traps and inertia. A focus on exploration at the expense of exploitation might lead to stick in ideas, but would leave the organization without the ability to reap the benefits. Dustman & Reilly (1996) showed that organizations are able to combine exploratory and exploitative activities.