Prior research argues that ambidexterity – excelling at both exploration and exploitation – allows firms to better weather dynamic global market strains and strive in competitive markets. While the recent technology advancements have provided firms to become ambidextrous, the simultaneous exploration of incumbent technologies and exploitation of new technologies purport to create substantial tensions within firms. Such tensions are especially pronounced in the information systems development (ISD) setting. Drawing evidence from a large qualitative data sample, this study introduces four tensions that arise when ISD projects strive to achieve ambidexterity. The study further demonstrates how such tensions compromise ISD project performance.

Biography 

Dr. Maduka Subasinghage is a senior lecturer at Auckland University of Technology, New Zealand. She is currently based at the School of Information Management of Victoria University of Wellington as a visiting scholar. She completed her PhD at Queensland University of Technology, Australia. Her research interests include project governance, knowledge management, information security and Enterprise Resource Planning Systems. Her research has been published in the Information & Management Journal, The Journal of Knowledge Management, Communications of the AIS, Enterprise Information Systems, VINE: The Journal of Information and Knowledge Management Systems and international conferences such as the International Conference on Information Systems (ICIS) and European Conference on Information Systems (ECIS).