CEO Paradoxical Leadership And Firm Performance

In the increasingly competitive market environment,how to balance survival and development,improve performance,maintain core competitiveness,has become a focus for all types of enterprises.With the integration and development of Taoist philosophy and management,the importance of paradoxical leadership has gradually been discovered by the academic and business communities.Paradoxical leadership follows the concept of "both-and," which can synergistically and flexibly solve organizational paradoxes,balance short-term efficiency and long-term development,stability and flexibility,adapt to and shape the collective power in the environment,and focus on shareholders and stakeholders.Therefore,this article aims to explore the impact mechanism of the paradoxical leadership style of the CEO on the financial performance(representative index of short-term efficiency)and innovation performance(representative index of long-term development)of the enterprise,based on the upper echelons theory.According to the upper echelons theory,a CEO with a paradoxical leadership style will incorporate the long-term sustainable development of the enterprise into the enterprise’s development planning map when formulating the enterprise’s development strategy,rather than just focusing on the current interests of the enterprise.Therefore,the CEO’s paradoxical leadership can accept temporary inefficiencies that do not threaten the basic survival of the company and support exploratory innovation that helps to exchange the future growth and long-term competitive advantage of the company.At the same time,the CEO’s paradoxical leadership can use its characteristics of maintaining short-term efficiency,organizational stability,and focusing on the interests of shareholders to evaluate existing methods,make timely adjustments,adopt new methods to achieve new goals,and re-determine the future action plan to promote the organization to use exploitative innovation,thereby ensuring the current efficiency of the enterprise and achieving short-term financial performance goals.In summary,this study explores the mediating role of dual innovation(exploratory innovation and exploitative innovation)in the relationship between CEO paradoxical leadership and enterprise performance.Furthermore,the upper echelons theory further points out that when exploring the impact of the CEO’s personal traits or leadership behavior,considering the environmental characteristics of the enterprise(such as environmental dynamics or stability)and examining the interaction between its characteristics and the CEO’s leadership style can more comprehensively and comprehensively explain the mechanism of the CEO’s leadership on the entity.This study chooses to focus on the variable of environmental dynamism,which reflects the rate of change and instability of the external environment of the enterprise.The paradoxical leadership of the CEO is believed to be more concerned with the development of dual innovation under the situational factors of high environmental dynamism,thereby enhancing enterprise performance.Our study has made contributions in three aspects.Firstly,different from previous studies that mainly focus on middle-level leaders in enterprises(such as department heads,team leaders,etc.),based on upper echelons theory,this article focuses on enterprise high-level leaders represented by CEOs,exploring the impact and mechanism of their paradoxical leadership style on enterprise effectiveness,enriching and expanding the existing research on paradoxical leadership.Secondly,this article reveals the impact mechanism of dual innovation in transmitting the impact of CEO paradoxical leadership on enterprise performance,which provides a new perspective for the research on the interaction between leadership style and innovation.Thirdly,this study selects environmental dynamism as a moderating variable to examine the influence of situational factors on the relationship between CEO paradoxical leadership and enterprise performance,which enriches the research on the interaction between leadership style and situational factors.The above study has found that,building upon the research on paradoxical leadership,it has filled a critical gap in understanding the impact of CEO paradoxical leadership on organizational effectiveness.The study has verified the important mediating mechanism of ambidextrous innovation in organizations,and has also expanded the relevant research on upper echelons theory.Moreover,the findings of this study provide guidance for managers on how to cope with the risks and challenges brought by dynamic environmental changes.