The Model Of Executive Mentoring And Its Effects On Organizational Innovativeness:The Role Of Cognitive Adaptability

Becoming more innovative is at the heart of sustained advantage for individuals and organizations alike.The importance of innovativeness for winning in today's competitive landscape is widely acknowledged,but how to become more innovative is less clear and still up for debate.Researchers have proven the vital nature of innovativeness,but struggle to find a theoretically strong and yet practical way to improve innovativeness given the challenges of its tacit and social nature.This research uses mentoring theory to explore for the first-time executive mentoring as a way to develop organizational innovativeness through cognitive adaptability.Although mentoring and the outcome of innovativeness have never been previously studied together,mentoring is an appropriate match in the relationship with innovativeness because it is also social in nature and has proven effective in developing tacit knowledge and skills.Therefore,this research explores key issues surrounding innovativeness through the lens of mentoring theory and does so at the less examined levels of top leadership within organizations where mentoring arguably has its greatest impact.In addition,mentoring at higher levels within the organization differs from mentoring at lower levels,however,the current literature is not clear on how executive mentoring differs.Therefore,we needed to develop a new construct to more accurately measure the effectiveness of executive mentoring in this dynamic context.We apply this new construct to the challenge of exploring further ways to improve organizational innovativeness.The ways in which these relationships can be mediated and moderated are also explored.The main research questions studied are how executive mentoring affects organizational innovativeness and what is the appropriate construct to measure the effectiveness of executive mentoring in this context.This research separates into four parts.Study 1 uses a multiple case study to further explore executive mentoring and set the stage for developing an appropriate construct.The main question in this study is:Does executive mentoring relate to innovativeness and what or are there unique dimensions,characteristics,successes,challenges,and differences of executive mentoring?This research begins exploring these questions by performing a multiple case study that includes a within-case analysis of 13 executive mentoring cases followed by a cross-case analysis.Findings show that executive mentoring has a similar support dimension as does general mentoring but also has the additional unique dimension of passion.Thus,the new proposed dimensions of mentoring are twofold.One,the support dimension which includes the vocational,psychosocial,and role modeling support provided by the mentor.Second,the new dimension of passion includes the perceived passion and preparedness of the mentor.These two dimensions combined more fully capture the effectiveness of the support and communication of executive mentoring.We also found that leaders are constantly and continuously being developed throughout their tenure.We found that it is not necessarily just what is inside a leader,such as capacity and attributes,that will affect their followers' capability,such as innovativeness,but also the way the leader is mentored affects the way they lead,which affects those they lead.The multiple case study performed provided an essential foundation for developing a new scale in Study 2 and also revealed several important variables in the executive mentoring interaction that will be tied in together in Study 3 and Study 4.Study 2 focuses on scale developing.The question we are exploring in this study is:Are the new executive mentoring construct and proposed dimensions valid?The constructs are validated through exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis.Executive mentoring's new dimensions of support and passion were validated through the EFA and CFA.Study 3 then continues to focus on mentoring higher-level leadership,such as the CEO,and empirically attempts to demonstrate its unique relationship to organizational innovativeness through cognitive adaptability with the newly developed construct.Thus,we finally seek to empirically discover:Will executive mentoring relate to organizational innovativeness through cognitive adaptability?This study used a questionnaire and sample that includes 215 mentored executives and entrepreneurs who personally identify and exploit opportunities.The reliability and validity of the results have been proved by using confirmatory factor analysis and advanced regression analytics.The findings confirm that mentoring top leaders or executives positively relates to their perceived innovativeness of the organization and that the relationship is mediated by cognitive adaptability.As a result,this research demonstrates the value of executive mentoring.Additionally,these findings encourage organizations to proactively and selectively prioritize mentoring among top leadership,taking into account their differing levels of cognitive adaptability.Study 4 examines the executive mentoring construct on the dimensional level and their effects on cognitive adaptability and organizational innovativeness.In addition,we examine the condition in which the executive mentoring construct and its dimensions are moderated.This study addresses which dimensions have a greater effect overall and what factors might also be influencing this vital relationship via moderation.This study uses a questionnaire and a sample size of 200 participants that were mentored executives.Confirmatory factor analysis and regression analysis confirmed the validity of the results.Results confirmed the hypothesis that the passion dimension of executive mentoring has the greatest impact on cognitive adaptability and innovativeness.Results also confirmed that the metacognitive experience dimension of cognitive adaptability did have the greatest effect on innovativeness,however,the metacognitive choice dimension had a greater impact on performance.Additionally,findings confirmed that psychological safety negatively moderates the relationship between the passion dimension and cognitive adaptability.Findings reveal that mindset does not moderate the relationship between the support dimension and cognitive adaptability,however,it does positively moderate the relationship between the passion dimension of executive mentoring and cognitive adaptability.Once again showing the importance of the passion dimension in executive mentoring.The results demonstrate the added value of the passion dimension in executive mentoring and the subsequent link to organizational innovativeness via cognitive adaptability.Theoretical and managerial implications and directions for further research are also discussed.In summary,this research has developed a new executive mentoring construct that has demonstrated the value of executive mentoring by its positive relation to organizational innovativeness through cognitive adaptability.This research also demonstrates that the passion dimension of executive mentoring has a stronger relationship with cognitive adaptability and innovativeness and should therefore be looked at more closely in practical implication and further theoretical research.