Regulatory focus as a psychological micro-foundation of leaders' exploration and exploitation activities

Abstract

In recent years, there has been strong interest in leaders' exploration and exploitation activities, especially because of their positive effects on performance. Most prior research in this area has focused on the organizational antecedents of leaders' exploration and exploitation activities, with less consideration given to the psychological precursors. This paper draws upon insights from the behavioral strategy literature to inform our theoretical perspective on leaders' exploration-exploitation activities. In particular, by conceptually linking leaders' regulatory focus and exploration-exploitation, we provide a theoretical framework to explain these activities from a psychological viewpoint. Moreover, we employ two moderator variables to better understand the different properties and boundaries of this framework. All in all, this paper has a number of implications for strategic leadership theory and practice.

Individual differences as antecedents of leader behavior: Towards an understanding of multi-level outcomes

“…First, this model was published as a part of the Leadership Quarterly special issue on individual differences in 2012, and therefore, most researchers in our field are now familiar with this model. Second, because the special issue attracted considerable scholarly attention, a number of papers have already been based on or made use of ideas from this model (e.g., Offord, Gill, & Kendal, 2016;Samnani & Singh, 2013;Tuncdogan et al, 2015). For instance, Offord, Gill and Kendal (2016) applied a grounded theory approach to generate a better understanding of the leadership process model.…”

“…For example, there is a significant relationship between personality traits -one of the key antecedents of various leadership behaviors and outcomes (e.g., Antonakis, 2011;Judge & Bono, 2004) -and the volume of different regions of the brain (DeYoung et al, 2010). A series of recent studies examined the neurological antecedents of exploration and exploitation tendencies (e.g., Laureiro-Martinez, Brusoni, & Zollo, 2010;Laureiro-Martinez, Brusoni, Canessa, & Zollo, 2015), which can play an important role in terms of leadership performance (e.g., Jansen, Vera, & Crossan, 2009;Tuncdogan et al, 2015). Other leadership-related tendencies, behaviors and traits that can be explained by neurological variables include intelligence and its sub-components (e.g., episodic memory), attention control, emotions, emotional reactivity, emotion recognition, sleep patterns, and the successful employment of the executive function, which is strongly linked to self-regulation (e.g., Goel et al, 2010;Nestor et al, 2015;Smith et al, 2011).…”

“…The regulatory focus of the CEO affects the performance level of small firms such that firms with a promotion-focused CEO are better off in more dynamic environments while those with a prevention-focused CEO fare better in more stable environments (Wallace, Little, Hill, & Ridge, 2010). Leaders' chronic regulatory foci are also associated with their exploration and exploitation activities (Tuncdogan et al, 2015). More specifically, regulatory focus mediates the effect of leaders' personality traits on their exploration and exploitation activities.…”

“…Because ethical leadership behaviors require the use of self-regulatory resources, they themselves might result in subsequent unethical behaviors, such as abusive supervision (Lin, Ma, & Johnson, 2016) Chronic Regulatory Focus Promotion/prevention focus, regulatory fit Chronic regulatory focus influences leaders' general tendencies towards exploration and exploitation activities (Tuncdogan, van den Bosch, & Volberda, 2015) Dark-Triad Personality Traits Narcissism, Machiavellianism, Psychopathy Narcistic CEOs can positively influence TMT behavioral integration and firm performance if they identify themselves strongly with the organization (Reina, Zhang, & Peterson, 2014) Background Variables Age, culture, family…”

“…In line with the journal's goal of reviving leadership research on individual differences (especially since the special issue in 2012), numerous articles on this theme have been published in the last couple of years (e.g., Cavazotte, Moreno, & Hickmann, 2012;Tuncdogan, van den Bosch, & Volberda, 2015). However, with this rapid growth comes a high degree of fragmentation, for at least two reasons.…”