Leader Traits & Relation Based Leadership in Achieving and Sustaining Contextual Ambidexterity

In this decade where markets are dynamic and turbulent, organizations need to constantly think about exploring the day of tomorrow, but also exploiting the present day. When organizations are able to do this, they act ambidextrous which leads to a sustained competitive advantage on rival organizations. To achieve and sustain ambidexterity is a hard task for organizations. Top management teams, managers and followers all play a prominent role. Several studies have been conducted the last years to understand how to achieve and sustain ambidexterity, most of the studies were conducted on macro level. Less studies have researched the individual or micro level of ambidexterity which also plays an important role to achieve and sustain ambidexterity. Leader traits and the relation between the follower and leader could play a role to achieve and sustain contextual ambidexterity, but got less attention in studies last years. When relations between the leader and follower can be marked as high-quality relation, high performance is being achieved according the literature. On the other hand, leader traits could tell us something about how traits play a role to achieve and sustain contextual ambidexterity and which traits are important to have for a leader. This thesis has researched how traits in combination with leader-member exchange theory play a role in achieving and sustaining contextual ambidexterity. Results show that leader traits: intelligence, working experience, flexibility, delegation of task and having a strong strategy & vision play important roles to effectively achieve and sustain contextual ambidexterity. Intelligence grants the leader the ability to solve complex problems and flexible switch between the transactional and transformational leadership behavior, which is needed for ambidexterity. The working experience of the leader can help to achieve and sustain contextual ambidexterity when business units are large, in smaller business units the working experience is less relevant. Results show that leaders should focus on building a strong relation with the follower, this generally improves the performance of a business unit and thus the ability to become ambidextrous with the business unit. When leaders are able to achieve the “partnership” phase, trust, discipline and mutual respect are at a high level which helps to achieve and sustain contextual ambidexterity. Leaders need to build a strong team within the business units to achieve and sustain contextual ambidexterity. When having a strong team with both exploitation and exploration expertise among the followers, ambidexterity can be achieved quicker. Organizations can use the thesis to understand the different roles the traits and relationships play in contextual ambidexterity and could hire or train managers, that fulfill the specific traits that are needed to achieve and sustain ambidexterity.