While a firm’s ability to jointly pursue both an exploitative and exploratory orientation has been posited as having positive performance effects, little is currently known about the antecedents and consequences of such ambidexterity in small-to medium-sized firms (SMEs). To that end, this study focuses on the pivotal role of top management team (TMT) behavioral integration in facilitating the processing of disparate demands essential to attaining ambidexterity in SMEs. Then, to address the bottom-line importance of an ambidextrous orientation, the study hypothesizes its association with relative firm performance. Multisource survey data, including CEOs and TMT members from 139 SMEs, provide support for both hypotheses.

We take stock of the current body of knowledge and understanding on organizational ambidexterity to further specify the construct and develop a typology to focus this line of research. To that end, we first synthesize the various insights on ambidexterity's conceptualization in extant research. We then develop a parsimonious, yet coherent typology that delineates four archetypes of ambidexterity using two primary dimensions underlying previous conceptualizations of this construct. To help focus and align extant research, we next map these types onto the most salient theories, antecedents, and outcomes that are uniquely germane to each. Finally, we offer several recommendations and promising avenues for future inquiries that follow from our typology and associated discussion.

Although the teleworking literature continues to raise concerns regarding the adverse consequences of professional isolation, researchers have not examined its impact on work outcomes. Consequently, the authors first examine professional isolation's direct impact on job performance and turnover intentions among teleworkers and then investigate the contingent role of 3 salient work-mode-related factors. Survey data from a matched sample of 261 professional-level teleworkers and their managers revealed that professional isolation negatively impacts job performance and, contrary to expectations, reduces turnover intentions. Moreover, professional isolation's impact on these work outcomes is increased by the amount of time spent teleworking, whereas more face-to-face interactions and access to communication-enhancing technology tend to decrease its impact. On the basis of these findings, an agenda for future research on professional isolation is offered that takes into account telework's growing popularity as a work modality.

Research about transformational CEOs' impact on firm-level outcomes, particularly corporate entrepreneurship, has been equivocal, partially because the underlying mechanisms remain largely unexplored. Given that the individuals most closely influenced by a firm's CEO are its top management team (TMT) members, we focus on the CEO-TMT interface as a salient intervening mechanism. We posit that transformational CEOs influence TMTs' behavioral integration, risk propensity, decentralization of responsibilities, and long-term compensation and that these TMT characteristics impact corporate entrepreneurship. Data from 152 firms supported most of our hypothesized links, underscoring how the CEO-TMT interface helps explain transformational CEOs' role in promoting corporate entrepreneurship.