Individual ambidexterity in SMEs: Towards a typology aligning the concept, antecedents and outcomes

Abstract

Individual ambidexterity is of vital importance to the competitive advantage of organizations, especially small and medium enterprises (SMEs). Yet the ambiguous conceptualization in literature hinders our understanding of the concept, its antecedents, and its outcomes. We use a systematic review to capture the development of individual ambidexterity in the literature since 2007, identifying several major issues obstructing its conceptual clarity. We further propose a typology based on the exploration-exploitation relationship. By identifying different types of individual ambidexterity and linking the concept to the context of SMEs, this review offers conceptual clarity and directions for studying individual ambidexterity in SMEs for future research.