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The purpose of this paper is to assess the impact and effectiveness of the LearnOvation leadership development program in the welfare services sector in Sweden.

LearnOvation was based on ambidexterity theory for the program content and the research study design. A mixed-method design was applied, using questionnaires among staff (n = 523) and written evaluations with the management teams (n = 60).

Quantitative analysis of the questionnaires indicated little change in managers' and staffs' innovation behaviors, though employee exploration behaviors were strongly and positively correlated with their innovation behaviors. Qualitative leader-written evaluations reported increased understanding of innovation management and the use of exploration and exploitation activities to involve staff in the implementation of creative ideas within the organization.

The authors argue that innovating is about creating a fertile ground for exploration and exploitation processes of learning that support staff's willingness to meet goals, as well as their capability to explore new ideas and experiment in new ways of working. Leadership development activities that engage the entire management team can build the necessary capacity and power to lead innovation processes in highly structured welfare services and free the employees' innovativeness, potentially leading to improved services and employee satisfaction.

With the goal of enhancing the innovation capacity in daily practice, this study adds to the scarcity of research in welfare services on how to actually support management's work on leading successful implementation of creative ideas.

This paper aims to explore whether the principles behind improvement methods and the underlying learning orientations of ambidexterity have the potential to support the managing of ideas for implementation.

By combining improvement methods and ambidexterity, this study presents a pragmatic framework for innovative working with a scientific underpinning linked to organizational learning.

The descriptive stages in the plan-do-check-act method for improvement are instructive in their focus on progress and helpful in untangling the more explanatory nature of ambidexterity to frame innovative working.

Although the framework’s usefulness for innovative working is subject to future studies, the implementation, validation and results of the framework in pilot research may contribute to the body of knowledge.

The proposed framework can be used in teaching the key role of strategic leadership to explore and exploit over time. The framework has the potential to guide innovative working in practice by making better use of the employees’ tacit knowledge in such a way that they are empowered to explore new ways of defining problems and searching for solutions to improve organizational performance. The results of the implementation will impact the employees’ quality of life.

This study advances the current understanding of how the seemingly contradictory activities of exploration and exploitation can model an integrative learning approach.