IT Enabled Agility in Organizational Ambidexterity

The aim of ambidextrous organizations is to balance exploratory and exploitative learning concepts. They innovate through experiments and research, and capture the value of innovations through refinement and continuous improvement. In this paper, we study the relationship of organizational ambidexterity and IT enabled agility. Based on a case study with a German car manufacturer we find that (1) entrepreneurial agility impedes exploitative concepts, (2) adaptive agility impedes exploratory concepts and (3) ambidextrous organizations exhibit structures that allow them to transfer results from exploratory to exploitative activities through IT enabled agility. Our findings suggest that exploitative concepts require IT enabled agility mechanisms that are incompatible with those for exploratory concepts, and oppositely. We found that knowledge transfer between business units often occurs, but is yet not fully integrated from an organizational perspective. We highlight the need for ambidextrous organizations to facilitate permeable boundaries with IT enabled agility by offering a transfer.