Abstract
The paper demonstrates that employee ambidexterity plays a critical role in achieving operational adaptability and the development of an organization in a dynamic environment. It advances theories of business process management by showing that process actors, who are capable of implementing change inherently and rapidly, can create flexible business processes. This allows for the effective meeting of customer needs and the achievement of business performance. The CATI method was utilized to examine 209 process actors from Polish enterprises. Given the survey’s size and nature, the PLS-SEM method was employed. The research results confirmed that organizations operating within an adaptiveness paradigm rely on actors who perform their work appropriately to the emerging circumstances. This confirms the necessity of conducting in-depth research on the social implications of agile BPM.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Accenture: Business agility report 2020 (2020). https://www.accenture.com/us-en/insights/technology/business-agility-report-2020. Accessed 22 Jan 2024
Andriopoulos, C., Lewis, M.: Exploitation-exploration tensions and organizational ambidexterity: managing paradoxes of innovation. Organ. Sci. 20(4), 696–717 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.1080.04062009
Badakhshan, P., Conboy, K., Grisold, T., vom Brocke, J.: Agile business process management. A ystematic literature review and an integrated framework. Bus. Process Manag. J. 26(6), 1505–1523 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1108/BPMJ-12-2018-0347
Bazan, P., Estevez, E.: Industry 4.0 and business process management: state of the art and new challenges. Bus. Process Manag. J. 28(1), 62–80 (2022)
Brown, T.A.: Confirmatory Factor Analysis for Applied Research, New York, London, The Guilford Press 34 (2006)
Bruno, G., et al.: Key challenges for enabling agile BPM with social software. J. Softw.: Evol. Process 23(4), 297–326 (2011)
Caputo, A., Marzi, G., Pellegrini, M.M.: The internet of things in manufacturing innovation processes: development and application of a conceptual framework. Bus. Process. Manag. J. 22(2), 341–358 (2016)
Chen, Y., Wang, Y., Nevo, S., Jin, J., Wang, L., Chow, W.S.: IT capability and organizational performance: the roles of business process agility and environmental factors, Eur. J. Inf. Syst. 1–17 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1057/ejis.2013.4
Chen, Y., Wang, Y., Nevo, S., Jin, J., Wang, L., Chow, W.S.: IT capability and organizational performance: the roles of business process agility and environmental factors. Eur. J. Inf. Syst. 23(3), 326–342 (2014)
Cronbach, J.: Coefficient alpha and the internal structure of tests. Psychometrika 16(3), 297–303 (1951)
Çulha, D., Dogru, A.: Towards an agile methodology for business process development, In: Nanopoulos, A., Schmid, W. (Eds), Proceedings of 6th International Conference, S-BPM ONE2014 in Eichst€att, pp. 133–142, Germany, Springer-Verlag, Cham (2014)
Di Ciccio, C., Marrella, A., Russo, A.: Knowledge-intensive processes: an overview of contemporary approaches. In: ter Hofstede A.H.M., Mecella M., Sardina S., Marrella A. (Eds.), 1st International Workshop on Knowledge-Intensive Business Processes (KiBPs), pp. 33–47 (2012)
Duncan, R.B.: The ambidextrous organization: designing dual structures for innovation. Manag. Organ. 1(1), 167–188 (1976)
Ghoshal, S., Bartlett, C.: Linking organizational context and managerial action: the dimensions of quality in management. Strateg. Manag. J. 15, 91–112 (1994)
Gibson, C.B., Birkinshaw, J.: The antecedents, consequences, and mediating role of organizational ambidexterity. Acad. Manag. J. 47(2), 209–226 (2004)
Grönroos, C., Voima, P.: Critical service logic: making sense of value creation and co-creation. J. Acad. Mark. Sci. 41(2), 133–150 (2013)
Guisado-González, M., González-Blanco, J., Coca-Pérez, J.L.: Analyzing the relationship between exploration, exploitation and organizational innovation. J. Knowl. Manag. 21(5), 1142–1162 (2017)
Hair, J.F., Ringle, C.M., Sarstedt, M.: PLS-SEM: indeed a silver bullet. J. Market. Theory Pract. Taylor Francis 19(2), 139–152 (2011)
Harrison, J.S., Wicks, A.C.: Stakeholder theory, value, and firm performance. Bus. Ethics Q. 23(1), 97–124 (2013)
Hibbert, S., Winklhofer, H., Temerak, M.S.: Customers as resource integrators: toward a model of customer learning. J. Serv. Res. 15(3), 247–261 (2012)
Houy, C., Fettke, P., Loos, P., Van Der Aalst, W.M., Krogstie, J.: Business process management in the large. Bus. Inf. Syst. Eng. 3(6), 385–388 (2011)
Huang, P.-Y., Pan, S.L., Ouyang, T.H.: Developing information processing capability for operational agility: implications from a Chinese manufacturer. Eur. J. Inf. Syst. 23, 462–480 (2014)
Hughes, M., Hughes, P., Morgan, R.E.: Exploitative learning and entrepreneurial orientation alignment in emerging young firms: implications for market and response performance. Br. J. Manag. 18, 359–375 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8551
Junni, P., Sarala, R.M., Taras, V., Tarba, S.Y.: Organizational ambidexterity and performance: a meta-analysis. Acad. Manag. Perspect. 27(4), 299–312 (2013)
Kaplan, R.S., Norton, D.P.: Transforming the balanced scorecard from performance measurement to strategic management: part I. Account. Horiz. 15(1), 87–104 (2001)
Khan, S., J., Mir, A.A.: Ambidextrous culture, contextual ambidexterity and new product innovations: the role of organizational slack and environmental factors. Business Strat. Environ. 28(4), 652–663 (2019)
Klammer, A., Gueldenberg, S.: Unlearning and forgetting in organizations: a systematic review of literature. J. Knowl. Manag. 23(5), 860–888 (2019)
Kolar, J., Pitner, T.: Agile BPM in the age of cloud technologies. Scal. Comput.: Pract. Exper. 13(4), 285–294 (2012)
Kuran, T.: The tenacious past: theories of personal and collective conservatism. J. Econ. (1988)
Lee, J.Y., Seo, Y., Jeung, W., Kim, J.H.: How ambidextrous organizational culture affects job performance: a multilevel study of the mediating effect of psychological capital,. J. Manag. Organ. 1(16) (2017). https://doi.org/10.1017/jmo.2017.38
Lee, O.K., Sambamurthy, V., Lim, K.H., Wei, K.K.: How does IT ambidexterity impact organizational agility? Inf. Syst. Res. 26(2), 398–417 (2015)
Leroi-Werelds, S.: An update on customer value: state of the art, revised typology, and research Agenda. J. Serv. Manag. 30(5), 650–680 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1108/JOSM-03-2019-0074
Liang, H., Wang, N., Xue, Y., Ge, S.: Unraveling the alignment paradox: how does business-IT alignment shape organizational agility? Inf. Syst. Res. 28(4), 863–879 (2017)
Lu, Y., Ramamurthy, K.: Understanding the link between information technology capability and organizational agility: an empirical examination. MIS Q. 35(4), 931–954 (2011)
Lusch, R.F., Vargo, S.L.: An overview of service-dominant logic. In: Vargo, S.L., Lusch, R.F. (Eds), The Sage Handbook of Service-Dominant Logic, pp. 3–21, Sage Publications, London (2018)
Malinova, M., Mendling, J.: Identifying do’s and don’ts using the integrated business process management framework. Bus. Process. Manag. J. 24(4), 882–899 (2018)
Mao, H., Gong, Y., Titah, T.: Understanding the relationship between IT capabilities and operational agility: a multimethod approach. J. Enterp. Inf. Manag. 36(2), 409–436 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1108/JEIM-12-2021-0521
Mao, H., Liu, S., Zhang, J., Zhang, Y., Gong, Y.: Information technology competency and organizational agility: roles of absorptive capacity and information intensity. Inf. Technol. People 34(1), 421–451 (2021)
March, J.G.: Exploration and exploitation in organizational learning. Organ. Sci. 2(1), 71–87 (1991). https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2.1.71
Martins, P.V., Zacarias, M.: An agile business process improvement methodology. Procedia Comput. Sci. 121, 129–136 (2017)
Marzi, G., Zollo, L., Boccardi, A., Ciappei, C.: Additive manufacturing in SMEs: empirical evidences from Italy. Int. J. Innov. Technol. Manag. 15(01) (2018)
Meyer, N., Schiffner, S.: Democratizing business process management: empowering process participants to contribute to the enactment of business processes. In: 2014 IEEE 16th Conference on Business Informatics, pp. 93–100 (2014)
Meziani, R., Magalhães, R.: Proposals for an agile business process management methodology. In: First International Workshop on Organizational Design and Engineering (2009)
Mikalef, P., Pateli, A.: Information technology-enabled dynamic capabilities and their indirect effect on competitive performance: findings from PLS-SEM and fsQCA. J. Bus. Res. 70, 1–16 (2017)
Miller, K.D., Pentland, B.T., Choi, S.: Dynamics of performing and remembering organizational routines. J. Manage. Stud. 49(8), 1536–1558 (2012)
Ngai, E.W.T., Chau, D.C.K., Chan, T.L.A.: Information technology, operational, and management competencies for supply chain agility: findings from case studies. J. Strateg. Inf. Syst. 20, 232–249 (2011)
Niu, K.-H., Li, H.: Knowledge management and organizational adaptation effectiveness: an empirical study. Int. J. Bus. Manag. Commer. 7(1), 10–26 (2022)
O’Reilly, C.A., Tushman, M.L.: Organizational ambidexterity: past, present, and future. Acad. Manag. Perspect. 27(4), 324–338 (2013)
Osterwalder, A., Pigneur, Y.: Business Model Generation. Wiley, Hoboken, NJ (2010)
Petrillo, A., Di Bona, G., Forcina, A., Silvestri, A.: Building excellence through the agile reengineering performance model (ARPM): a strategic business model for organizations. Bus. Process. Manag. J. 24(1), 128–157 (2018)
Prakash, A., Jha, S.K., Prasad, K.D., Singh, A.K.: Productivity, quality and business performance: an empirical study. Int. J. Product. Perform. Manag. 66(1), 78–91 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1108/IJPPM-03-2015-0041
Raisch, S., Birkinshaw, J., Probst, G., Tushman, M.L.: Organizational ambidexterity: balancing exploitation and exploration for sustained performance. Organ. Sci. 20(4), 685–695 (2009)
Rialti, R., Marzi, G., Silic, M., Ciappei, C.: Ambidextrous organization and agility in big data era. The role of business process management systems. Bus. Process Manag. J. 24(5), 1091–1109 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1108/BPMJ-07-2017-0210
Rialti, R., Zollo, L., Pellegrini, M.M., Ciappei, C.: Exploring the antecedents of brand loyalty and electronic word of mouth in social-media-based brand communities: do gender differences matter? J. Glob. Mark. 30(3), 147–160 (2017)
Sarstedt, M., Hair, J.F., Jr., Nitzl, C., Ringle, C.M., Howard, M.C.: Beyond a tandem analysis of SEM and PROCESS: Use of PLS-SEM for mediation analyses. Int. J. Mark. Res. 62(3), 288–299 (2020)
Schmenner, R., Swink, M.: On theory in operations management. J. Oper. Manag. 17(1), 97–113 (1998)
Schmitt, A., Hörner, S.: Systematic literature review – improving business processes by implementing agile. Bus. Process. Manag. J. 27(3), 868–882 (2021)
Simsek, Z., Heavey, C., Veiga, J.F., Souder, D.: A typology for aligning organizational ambidexterity’s conceptualizations, antecedents, and outcomes. J. Manage. Stud. 46(5), 864–894 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-6486.2009.00841.x
Sneyd, K.P., Rowley, J.: Linking strategic objectives and operational performance: an action research-based exploration. Meas. Bus. Excell. 8(3), 42–51 (2004)
Spiegel, M., Schmiedel, T., vom Brocke, J.: What makes change harder – or easier. MIT Sloan Manag. Rev. 58(3), 88–89 (2017)
Suša Vugec, D., Tomičić-Pupek, K., Bosilj Vukšić, V.: Social business process management in practice: overcoming the limitations of the traditional business process management. International Journal of Engineering Business Management 10, 1–10 (2018)
Sutherland, J., Schwaber, K.: The scrum guide (2016). http://www.scrumguides.org. Accessed on 15 Jan 2024
Tallon, P.: Inside the adaptive enterprise: an information technology capabilities perspective on business process agility. Inf. Technol. Manage. 9(1), 21–36 (2008)
Tan, F., Pan, S.L., Zuo, M.: Realising platform operational agility through information technology–enabled capabilities: a resource-interdependence perspective. Info Syst. J. 29, 582–608 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1111/isj.12221
Thiemich, C., Puhlmann, F.: An agile BPM project methodology. In: Daniel, F. et al. (Eds), Business Process Management: 11th International Conference, BPM 2013, Proceedings, August 26–30, pp. 291–306, Springer, Beijing and Berlin Heidelberg (2013)
Thompson, G., Seymour, L.F., O’Donovan, B: Towards a BPM success model: an analysis in South African financial services organisations. In: Halpin, T., et al. (Eds), Enterprise, Business-Process and Information Systems Modeling. Lecture Notes in Business Information Processing, vol. 29, pp. 1-13, Springer, Heidelberg (2009).
Tian, X., Pavur, R., Han, H., Zhang, L.: A machine learning-based human resources recruitment system for business process management: using LSA BERT and SVM. Bus. Process Manag. J. 29(1), 202–222 (2023)
Valmohammadi, C., Roshanzamir, S.: The guidelines of improvement: relations among organizational culture, TQM and performance. Int. J. Prod. Econ. 164, 167–178 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijpe.2014.12.028
van der Aalst, W.M.P., et al.: Business process mining: an industrial application. Inf. Syst. 32(5), 713–732 (2007)
Vargo, S.L., Lusch, R.F.: Evolving to a new dominant logic for marketing. J. Mark. 68(1), 1–17 (2004)
vom Brocke, J., Rosemann, M.: Business Process Management, Wiley Encyclopedia of Management, Management Information Systems, vol. 7, pp. 1–9. Wiley (2014)
von Rosing, M., Gill, A.Q.: Applying agile principles to BPM. In: von Rosing, M., von Scheel, J., Scheer, A.-W. (Eds), The Complete Business Process Handbook - Body of Knowledge from Process Modeling to BPM, Vol. I, pp. 557–581 Elsevier – Morgan Kaufmann, Waltham, MA (2015)
Vrontis, D., Thrassou, A., Santoro, G., Papa, A.: Ambidexterity, external knowledge and performance in knowledge-intensive firms. J. Technol. Transf. 42(2), 374–388 (2017)
Wamba-Taguimdje, S.-L., Fosso Wamba, S., Kala Kamdjoug, J.R., Tchatchouang Wanko, C.E.: Influence of artificial intelligence (AI) on firm performance: the business value of AI-based transformation projects. Bus. Process. Manag. J. 26(7), 1893–1924 (2020)
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Ethics declarations
Disclosure of Interests
The authors have no competing interests to declare that are relevant to the content of this article.
Specification of the measurement model (results of the confirmatory factor analysis)
Specification of the measurement model (results of the confirmatory factor analysis)
1.1 AI technologies (AIT), CR = 0.930, Cronbach’s α = 0.895, AVE = 0.772 | |
The use of artificial intelligence allows us to create new and innovative process solutions | 0.665 |
Machine learning algorithms help us monitor process results | 0.947 |
Machine learning algorithms help us choose the best method to streamline processes | 0.952 |
AI-based technologies allow us to monitor changes to customer behavior on an ongoing basis | 0.919 |
1.2 Agile methods and practices (AMP), CR = 0.897, Cronbach’s α = 0.847, AVE = 0.686 | |
Agile methodologies help us implement changes to business processes | 0.829 |
We focus on our customer expectations and requirements in the course of day-to-day meetings | 0.763 |
The use of retrospective allows us to continuously perfect our abilities and learn from changes | 0.866 |
The agile approach stimulates openness to change and experimentation | 0.853 |
1.3 Agile organizational culture (AOC), CR = 0.864, Cronbach’s α = 0.790, AVE = 0.614 | |
Thanks to organizational culture based on agility, our organization can quickly respond to changes | 0.776 |
Our organizational culture promotes experimentation and learning from retrospection | 0.785 |
In our organization, there is consent to the departure from the established operational methods and to the learning of new ones to meet our customer expectations better | 0.777 |
The management allows us to combine adaptation- and development-oriented activities | 0.795 |
2.1 Contextual ambidexterity (CA), CR = 0.910, Cronbach’s α = 0.868, AVE = 0.717 | |
Our employees are able to innovate and refine processes simultaneously | 0.841 |
As employees, we are open to change and able to implement it fast | 0.823 |
We can explore new opportunities and exploit existing processes simultaneously | 0.862 |
We are capable of conducting process-based and project-based operations simultaneously | 0.860 |
3.1 Operational agility (OA), CR = 0.956, Cronbach’s α = 0.947, AVE = 0.731 | |
Our operations are flexible and can be easily adapted to market changes | 0.861 |
Our business processes are simple and easy to modify with a view to creating value | 0.744 |
We are able to quickly adapt our operations to market changes | 0.866 |
We adapt our business processes to meet the evolving market requirements | 0.894 |
Our organization quickly adapts to changes in the business environment | 0.888 |
The ability to respond fast to changes is the key to our adaptability | 0.878 |
Our operations are flexible to meet the changing business demands | 0.890 |
Our organization is constantly searching for new opportunities while relying on its existing experience | 0.807 |
4.1 Business performance (BP), CR = 0.917, Cronbach’s α = 0.879, AVE = 0.736 | |
Our organization has better financial results than competing organizations | 0.775 |
We fulfill the planned financial and non-financial objectives | 0.877 |
Our operational methods contribute to strengthening our competitive advantage | 0.895 |
Our operational methods support the long-term development of our organization | 0.878 |
4.2 Value co-creation (VC), CR = 0.923, Cronbach’s α = 0.888, AVE = 0.749 | |
Our customers actively participate in the process of product and service value co-creation | 0.868 |
Our processes are comprehensible to customers, which facilitates their engagement in value co-creation | 0.887 |
We are open to changes which positively affect the value creation process for customers | 0.811 |
We continuously cooperate with our customers on new methods to create value | 0.893 |
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2024 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this paper
Cite this paper
Hofman, M., Grela, G., Orzelska, P., Banaś, J. (2024). Adapting to Change: Employees Ambidexterity as a Driver for Operational Adaptability and Organizational Development. In: Di Ciccio, C., et al. Business Process Management: Blockchain, Robotic Process Automation, Central and Eastern European, Educators and Industry Forum. BPM 2024. Lecture Notes in Business Information Processing, vol 527. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-70445-1_16
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-70445-1_16
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-031-70444-4
Online ISBN: 978-3-031-70445-1
eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)