A self-regulation perspective on individual ambidexterity

本研究旨在通过对员工创新绩效的自我调节来推进个体双智性的研究。双智性传统上定位于组织层面的分析，描述了公司管理因利用现有能力(利用)而产生的紧张关系的能力，同时尝试新的能力(探索)以获得创新成功(Gupta等人，2006年)。该领域越来越多的人认识到，公司平衡勘探和开采的努力在个人的日常工作中发挥着作用，这些个人的任务是探索新知识和利用先前存在的专门知识，以满足效率标准(Ma等人，2015年)。然而，对个人如何才能在这两项活动中表现出色的呼吁基本上没有得到重视(特纳等人，2013年)。这项研究解决了当代工作场所的这一问题，使员工能够承担更大的责任，并对自己的任务拥有更大的决策权。员工参与决策与他们追求一系列不同目标的意图明显相关，并积极决定如何在这些目标之间分配他们的时间(Lord等人，2010年)。这种能力是实现个体双智性所必需的行为矛盾心理的特征(Gibson&Birkinshaw，2004)。通过在自我调节理论(Frayne&Latham，1987)中研究个体的双智性，该项目为双智性作为一种可学习现象提供了一个新的案例。也就是说，员工被认为是积极的目标制定者，他们评估他们在实现目标方面的进展(即探索性目标与开采性目标)，并在当前状态与期望状态之间出现差异时相应地修改他们的认知或行为(Leventhal等人，1980年)。在自我调节领域以前的研究基础上，将目标定向定位为行为的有力预测因素(DeShon等人，2004年)，该项目调查了学习定向(LG)和证明目标定向(PG)之间的关联，作为个人双智性的先行因素。具体地说，本研究假设LG导向(即参与具有挑战性的个人成长任务的动机)和PG导向(即向他人证明一次胜任能力)分别与员工的探索性和剥削性活动呈正相关。此外，研究人员提出，双智型领导可能通过所谓的“开放”(OLB)和“关闭”(CLB)领导行为来促进员工的LG和PG取向的表达(Rosing等人，2011)。前者描述了增加员工行为差异的努力(例如，鼓励追随者挑战现状)，而后者敌意地指的是减少差异的举措(例如，采取行动制定指导方针)。鉴于OLB和CLB功能与个体层面上的勘探和开发功能的匹配性质，本研究测试了跨级别的调节效应。该项目还将包括对员工层面创新的衡量。这项研究努力为创新研究做出几项贡献。其中包括对如何通过不同的目标导向自我调节个人的两面性以产生创新绩效的详细理解。支持的假设意味着从业者至少可以通过两种方法来促进个人的双智性：建议领导者培养员工自我调节所需的持续学习能力，并提高他们自己的OLB和CLB的质量，以促进员工的双智性行为。这些见解可以转化为公司的人力资源开发实践和具体的人员选择标准，这些公司努力最大限度地提高工作场所在员工层面上的创新积极性。

This research project is set out to advance the study of individual ambidexterity through a self-regulation perspective on employees' innovative performance. Ambidexterity has been traditionally located at the organizational level of analysis, describing the ability of companies to manage the tensions that arise from leveraging existing competencies (exploitation) while experimenting with novel ones (exploration) for innovative success (Gupta et al., 2006). There is a growing recognition in the field that corporate efforts to balance exploration and exploitation play out in the daily job roles of individuals who are tasked to explore new knowledge and exploit pre-existing know-how to meet efficiency standards (Mom et al., 2015). Yet, calls for developing an understanding of exactly how individuals can excel at both activities have gone largely unheeded (Turner et al., 2013). The present research addresses this issue at contemporary workplaces that allow employees to assume greater responsibility and decision-making authority over their tasks. Employees' engagement in decision-making has been markedly associated with their intent to pursue a diverse range of goals and actively decide how to divide their time between them (Lord et al., 2010). This ability is characteristic of the behavioural ambivalence necessary for achieving individual ambidexterity (Gibson & Birkinshaw, 2004). By contextualizing the study of individual ambidexterity within the theory of self-regulation (Frayne & Latham, 1987), the project makes a novel case for ambidexterity as a learnable phenomenon. Namely, employees are recognized as active goal-setting agents who evaluate their progress towards goal achievement (i.e., exploration vs. exploitation goals) and modify their cognition or behaviours accordingly when discrepancies arise between their current and desired state (Leventhal et al., 1980). Building on previous research in the realm of self-regulation that positions goal orientations as strong predictors of behaviour (DeShon et al., 2004), the project investigates the association between learning (LG) and prove-goal (PG) orientations as antecedents of individual ambidexterity. Specifically, the study hypothesizes that LG orientation (i.e., motivation to engage in challenging tasks for personal growth) and PG orientation (i.e., drive to prove once competence to others) positively relate to employees' explorative and exploitative activities, respectively. Furthermore, the researchers propose that ambidextrous leadership may facilitate the expression of employees' LG and PG orientations via so-called 'opening' (OLB) and 'closing' (CLB) leadership behaviours (Rosing et al., 2011). While the former describes efforts that increase variance in employee behaviours (e.g., encouraging followers to challenge the status quo), the latter antagonistically refers to initiatives that reduce variance (e.g., taking action to set guidelines). Given the matching nature of OLB and CLB functions with those of exploration and exploitation at the individual level, the present study tests for cross-level moderation effects. The project will also include a measure of employee-level innovation.The study strives to make several contributions to innovation research. These include an elaborated understanding of how individual ambidexterity may be self-regulated via distinct goal orientations to yield innovative performance. Supported hypotheses imply at least two approaches along which practitioners may promote individual ambidexterity: Leaders are advised to develop employees' continuous learning capacities necessary for self-regulation and evolve the quality of their own OLB and CLB to facilitate the ambidextrous behaviour of their employees. These insights may translate onto human resource development practices and specific personnel selection criteria at corporations that strive to maximize their workplaces for innovative proactivity at the employee level.