Impact Of Ambidexterity On Firm Performance Of SMEs And Moderating Role Of Organizational Slack:Evidence From China

We investigated the relationship of various dimension of ambidexterity,i.e.Balanced dimension of ambidexterity(BD),combined dimension(CD)of ambidexterity,and international ambidexterity(IE),and firm performance.We proposed that BD,CD,and IE have positive and significant relationship with firm performance.We also proposed that organizational slack has a moderating effect on the relationship between BD and firm performance as well as CD and firm performance.In order to investigate these relationships,we gathered data from 153 SMEs which manufacture wastewater treatment machinery in Hunan,China.We rigorously checked the data for validity and reliability by calculating Cronbach ' s alpha,Kaiser-Meyer-Oklin(KMO),and t-statistic value for the all the constructs of the questionnaire.We employed Kolmogorov-Smirnov test to check normality of the data.Then we used regression to test our hypotheses.We found that IE has a positive and significant correlation(?= 0.215 at p<0.05)with firm performance.However,we found that BD doesn't have a significant relationship with firm performance and organizational slack also doesn't moderate this relationship significantly.CD and firm performance have a positive and significant correlation(?= 0.272 at p<0.05)and organizational slack also significantly moderates the relationship between CD and firm performance(?= 0.223 at p<0.05).Thus,we conclude that SMEs from transitioning economies should look at exploitation and exploration(ambidexterity)as synergistic strategies rather than paradoxical in order to achieve better firm performance.Also,pursuit of ambidexterity in order to achieve higher firm performance,context should also take the context into consideration such as organizational slack.