Organizational ambidexterity clearly trumps top leadership, and certainly so in turbulent times

Every so often, a new leadership kid on the block is introduced—replacing yesterday's hype with that of tomorrow. We move from transformational to charismatic leadership, and from the latter to authentic leadership, and next to responsible leadership, and so and so forth. This chapter joins many others in arguing that this impressive hype production curve is only marginally productive, at best. So, rather than investing in developing and/or examining the next novel leadership style, or even the next new leadership contingency, we should invest in developing a deep understanding of how organizations can become resilient against yet another leadership hype(and, oftentimes, yet another leadership mistake). Individual leadership is highly overrated at the expense of recognizing the critical importance of organizational characteristics, particularly those captured by the notion of organizational ambidexterity. The chapter develops a theory linking organizational ambidexterity with three contingencies—organizational resilience, organizational slack, and entrepreneurial leadership—and organizational performance.