Salesperson Self-Regulated Learning and Online Customers’ Patronage: An Ambidexterity Perspective

Although the roles of exploratory and exploitative learning as alternative sales skills have been documented, there is not yet a clear consensus, and empirical evidence in the online sales context is lacking. In addition, existing studies have tended to examine the two activities in parallel, without looking into the dyadic situation of balanced or imbalanced exploratory-exploitative learning. Grounded in the WeChat business context, this study explores how online sales agents’ balanced and imbalanced ambidextrous learning influence customers’ e-loyalty and, in turn, their patronage intention and behavior. Polynomial regression and response surface analysis are performed on 226 dyads, and the results support the hypothesized balance effect. Further, asymmetrical imbalance effects are identified, with customers exhibiting higher e-loyalty and better patronage outcomes when online sales agents adopt more exploitative learning than exploratory learning. This study helps improve understanding of the efficiency of personal selling in a virtual context.

Collaborate to learn and learn to collaborate: a case of exploitative learning in the inter-organizational project

PurposeManagement of inter-organizational projects focuses on the collective benefits of a group of organizations on a shared activity for a limited period and the coordination among them. However, how learning is facilitated in the inter-organizational project remains under-developed in the literature.Design/methodology/approachThis research analyses the exploitative learning process in the longest tunnel project on land in the Netherlands realized in a densely populated area. Data were collected through archived documents, in-depth interviews, site visits in the ethnographic research to analyze the actors, the daily practices and social situations in projects.FindingsThe empirical findings indicate that exploitative learning is promoted positively between the owner and the contractor and internally within the contractor. The most significant change that the exploitative learning process has led to is the change in mindset toward the collaboration. Project culture is considered to be shaped by exploitative learning in the inter-organizational project. However, there is a gap between the transfer of knowledge from the inter-organizational project to the parent organization.Originality/valueThe findings have implications for understanding learning in the inter-organizational project setting.

The role of ethical leadership in enhancing exploitative and explorative learning simultaneously: what does it matter if employees view work as central?

PurposeThe present study aimed to test the hypothesis that ethical leadership positively contributes to exploitative learning and explorative learning simultaneously and then examine the moderating role of work centrality in the relationships of ethical leadership with exploitative learning and explorative learning.Design/methodology/approachTime-lagged survey data were collected from 257 middle managers and their 257 immediate supervisors in 76 firms in China. Data were analyzed using structural equation modeling and Hayes' PROCESS macro for SPSS.FindingsThe results revealed that ethical leadership positively contributed to exploitative learning and explorative learning simultaneously. Importantly, the authors found that work centrality strengthened the positive relationships of ethical leadership with both exploitative learning and explorative learning.Practical implicationsThe findings can help organizations enhance exploitative learning and explorative learning simultaneously and enable them to gain a sustainable competitive advantage.Originality/valueAlthough explorative learning and exploitative learning together constitute fundamental resources for organizations' long-term success, prior research has not looked into whether and when leader behaviors facilitate explorative learning and exploitative learning simultaneously. The study contributed to fill this gap by introducing ethical leadership, signifying its positive role in enhancing both explorative learning and exploitative learning, and establishing work centrality as a moderator to reinforce these two positive relationships.

Learning Within Teams: A Multilevel Analysis of Team Behavioral Integration and Creativity

Innovation, a process fueled by creativity, is key to organizational survival. The current studies test a multilevel moderated mediation model to explore whether team behavioral integration influences individual creativity in general management teams. Two field surveys were conducted: Study 1 included 356 employees nested in 86 teams; Study 2 included 138 employees nested in 39 teams. Results from integrated path analyses demonstrate that team behavioral integration is positively related to individual creativity, explorative and exploitative learning mediate the relationship, and the indirect effects are stronger for individuals with higher creative self-efficacy. Implications and suggestions for future research are discussed.

Operating principles for collective scholar-activism: Early insights from the Agroecology Research-Action Collective

Scholar-activism is attractive to researchers who want not just to learn about the world, but about how to change that world. Agri-food studies have experienced a surge in the past two decades in researchers who see closer ties to social move­ments as key to food systems change. Yet to date, much scholar-activism depends on individually negotiated researcher-movement relationships, which may or may not be sustained long term and where knowledge can remain siloed. The Agro­ecology Research-Action Collective (ARC) seeks something different. Born of a desire to subordi­nate scholarship for scholarship’s sake to the needs and exigencies of movements, ARC envisages collective processes, horizontal non-exploitative learning among ourselves and with movements, and mechanisms for multidirectional accounta­bility. This reflective essay is the story of how ARC set out to “get our house in order”: to organize ourselves as scholars committed to systematizing more accountable and reciprocal relationships with frontline communities and grassroots movements. We first share the Principles & Protocols that guide our actions and the process through which we developed them. We then discuss two intercon­nected arenas in which ARC is developing a com­munity of practice guided by the Principles & Protocols. The first arena is through integrating participatory education into our everyday teaching and mentoring. The second arena is working to achieve broader social and institutional change by sharing methods and strategies for mobilizing resources and legitimating knowledge, both old and new.

Team psychological capital and innovation: the mediating of team exploratory and exploitative learning

Purpose The purpose of this study is to investigate the impact of team psychological capital (PsyCap) on team innovation. The study also examines the mediating role of team learning, including exploratory and exploitative learning, in team innovation. Design/methodology/approach A sample of 272 team leaders of firms in Vietnam was surveyed to validate the measures via confirmatory factor analysis and to test the model and hypotheses using structural equation modeling. Findings The results demonstrate that team PsyCap has a positive effect on team innovation. Further, team exploratory learning mediates the relationship between team PsyCap and team innovation; however, team exploitative learning does not. Although team exploitative learning is explained by team PsyCap, it does not enhance team innovation. Practical implications The study findings suggest that, to enjoy a high level of team exploratory and exploitative learning and innovation, firms should develop team PsyCap. This could be undertaken by implementing leader–subordinate mentoring programs, together with creating a social context that helps in interacting and communicating among team members. Originality/value This study is among the first to examine the role of team PsyCap in team exploratory and exploitative learning and innovation, adding further insight to the literature on innovation at the team level.

Effect of Internal Knowledge Sourcing on MNEs Subsidiaries’ Service Innovation Performance. The Role of Exploitative Learning and Entrepreneurial Orientation

This study assessed the influence of internal knowledge sourcing on MNEs subsidiaries’ service innovation performance. It also considered the moderating role of entrepreneurial orientation, as well as the mediating role of exploitative learning. Empirical analysis was based on primary data gathered from 156 MNE subsidiaries. Various validity and reliability checks were conducted before the presentation of the actual analysis, which was conducted using Ordinary Least Squares approach, run using SPSS (v. 20). Findings indicate that, exploitative learning partially mediates the relationship between internal knowledge sourcing and MNE subsidiaries’ service innovation performance. Entrepreneurial orientation however, dampens the positive relationship between internal knowledge sourcing and exploitative learning. This study adds to the existing debate in the arena of knowledge-based view of the firm.

Explorative and Exploitative Learning Affected by Extraneous Cognitive Load and Gameplay Anxiety in a Gestalt Perception Game

In line with the attention-to-affect model, this study employed a game that encompasses Gestalt perception to explore how extraneous cognitive load (ECL) and gameplay anxiety correlate with attitude towards exploitative learning and attitude towards explorative learning as students play the Visual-Saliency game (VSG) with images of artworks. The data of 56 sixth-grade students were collected and subjected to Smart PLS analysis to verify the pathways. The results of this study show that ECL is negatively related to attitude towards exploitative learning and attitude towards explorative learning. However, gameplay anxiety is negatively related to attitude towards exploitative learning, but is not significantly related to explorative learning when playing the VSG. The implication of this study is that Gestalt perception in game playing can give students more opportunities to practice reasoning, and they can gain more knowledge about the artworks themselves.