The effects of organizational ambidexterity on innovation performance: The mediating role of social media strategic capability

Abstract

There is an increasing interest in organizations for the use of social media relating to innovation, yet current literature reveals limited studies in the context of developing strategic uses of social media by small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). The purpose of this research was to investigate the direct effects of two components of organizational ambidexterity, social media strategic capability, and innovation performance as well as the moderating effects of environmental dynamism in the relationship between the two components of organizational ambidexterity and social media strategic capability, the moderating effect of entrepreneurial orientation, effectual orientation in the relationship between social media strategic capability and innovation performance, and to investigate the mediating effect of social media strategic capability in the relationship between the two components of organizational ambidexterity and innovation performance.

This research used survey research. Data for the study is based on the data from 221 small and medium-sized enterprises as information and communication technology (ICT) businesses in Thailand. The literature’s existing scales were used to operationalize the constructs proposed in this research. Based on the responses to the questionnaire, this research applied the structural equation modeling technique to test the hypotheses. The marker variable technique had been implemented to confirm the minimal risk of common method variance. Moreover, data were validated and passed the convergent and discriminant validity tests through various analyses.

The empirical results showed that the two components of organizational ambidexterity (both exploitation and exploration) played significant roles in affecting social media strategic capability and innovation performance. Particularly, social media strategic capability significantly played in critical role a mediating between two components of organizational ambidexterity (both exploitation and exploration) and innovation performance. Moreover, environmental dynamism was not a moderator in the relationship between two components of organizational ambidexterity (both exploitation and exploration) and social media strategic capability. Furthermore, the finding supported the moderating effect of entrepreneurial orientation in the relationship between social media strategic capability and innovation performance. However, the finding did not support the moderating effect of effectual orientation in the relationship between social media strategic capability and innovation performance. These findings provided theoretical and managerial contributions as well as future research directions.

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