These days organizations should engage both in exploratory and exploitative innovation, often referred to as organizational ambidexterity, resulting in higher levels of performance (He & Wong, 2004; Lubatkin et al., 2006; Sirén Kohtamäki, and Kuckertz, 2012; Uotila et al., 2009). Exploratory innovation is associated with opportunity- seeking activities of firms and refers to the extent to which they depart from existing knowledge to develop radical changes aimed at emerging markets (Mihalache et al, 2014). Exploitative innovation deals with advantage- seeking organizational activities, referring to the degree in which these firms pursue incremental innovations that address the demands of existing customers and markets (Mihalache et al, 2014). They posit that top management team (TMT) shared leadership enhances ambidexterity by improving the organization’s ability to resolve conflicts and to process information and strategic alternatives together.This investigation concludes that the public library Assen was ambidextrous and TMT shared leadership positively affected organizational ambidexterity of public library Assen. This conclusion is based on a multidimensional perspective: a multipersonal, an interpersonal and an intrapersonal perspective, more specifically a questionnaire, a semi-structured in-depth interview and a systems constellation. These findings share the outcome of Mihalache et al. (2014) that TMT shared leadership positively affects organizational ambidexterity.Theoretically, this investigation implies that the claim of Mihalache et al. (2014) ‘TMT shared leadership affects organizational ambidexterity’ in the private sector, might be transferred to the public library sector. However, this implication should be seen as preliminary as the investigated case organizations’ respondents only consisted of seven TMT library members. Future research, including vertical levels of the TMT and including more constructs (Mihalache et al., 2014) from a multidimensional perspective, is recommended as this could reveal if and how shared leadership affects organizational ambidexterity, resulting in higher levels of performance.Library Assen is part of the steering group of the Bredebieb organization where often pilots are held, with projects such as ‘E-books’ and ’21st Century skills’, and is therefore an important influencer amongst libraries. A next step could be investigating the total fifty-seven Dutch library centers (Leesmonitor (2015) to overcome the transitional problems they are facing. Through active agenda setting of TMT’s (Birkinshaw, Hamel, & Mol, 2008,p. 833) these organizations might frame and face their role of shared leadership in enhancing their libraries’organizational ambidexterity. So for higher level of innovation performance, library TMT’s should focus on shared leadership boosting their organizational ambidexterity.
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