Behavioural ambidexterity: effects on individual well-being and high performance work in academia

ABSTRACT

Academic work demands behavioural ambidexterity: the ability to simultaneously demonstrate exploration (creativity in research and/or in innovative teaching and learning practice) and exploitation (compliance with quality assurance). However, little is known about the effects of behavioural ambidexterity on the well-being of individual employees. We explore the experiences of men working in academic roles at universities in Sweden and the UK. More specifically, we examine the relations between behavioural ambidexterity and perceptions of well-being using an interpretative approach based on narrative analysis. Despite societal differences between Sweden and the UK, academics in both countries felt ill-equipped to fulfil the demands for ambidexterity. This resulted in mixed performance outcomes with serious implications for well-being. We identify and discuss the influence of personal circumstances and the role of agency in work design as two key antecedents of positive well-being outcomes.

KEYWORDS:

• behavioural ambidexterity
• performance
• well-being
• agency

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. For the purpose of this article, this general description suffices. We acknowledge that there is a lot more to be said about the political climate in both countries, but such a discussion is outside the scope of this article.

2. The REF is the system for assessing the quality of research in UK HEIs. For detailed information, please go to www.ref.ac.uk/.

3. For an in-depth discussion about the research methodology, methods and processes, please see (Ani Raiden and Christine Räisänen), Combining gendered strategies, a narrative approach and coaching to examine the effect of behavioural ambidexterity on individual well-being and high performance work, in Wheatley, D. (ed.), Handbook of Research Methods on the Quality of Working Lives (Edward Elgar, forthcoming).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Ani Raiden

Ani Raiden is Senior Lecturer in Human Resource Management at Nottingham Business School. She teaches international human resource management, principles of management, and people resourcing on postgraduate courses in the Nottingham Business School. Ani’s research interests generally are in the area of people resourcing and strategic HRM, specifically in connection with ‘quality of working life’. Recently, her focus has been on work–life balance, gender and health and safety. Ani is a Chartered Member of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) and a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy.

Christine Räisänen

Christine Räisänen is a linguist by training, and currently a full professor emerita at the Division of Construction Management at Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden. Her research builds on the sociology of work and philosophical considerations of space, place and aesthetic action. Christine runs courses on leadership and academic writing primarily for Master’s and PhD students in Sweden and the UK.

Gail Kinman

Gail Kinman is a Chartered Psychologist and an Associate Fellow of the British Psychological Society, and a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. She is the Director of the Research Centre for Applied Psychology at the University of Bedfordshire. Gail’s research interests are in the area of occupational health psychology. Gail has a long-standing interest in the psychosocial working conditions of those who do emotionally demanding and knowledge-intensive work and the implications for their well-being, work–life balance and job performance. Another key interest is the ways in which working conditions influence sickness behaviours such as presenteeism. Gail has conducted research in these areas with various occupational groups, with a particular focus on ‘helping’ professionals such as those working in health and social care, prison officers and fire and rescue personnel, members of the clergy and knowledge-intensive workers such as academics.