During her time as Global Corporate R&D Vice President and Chief Science Officer at Mars, Maria Velissariou practiced the prevailing concept of ambidexterity in leadership and organizational development. Today, she is keen to propagate the concept for the benefit of others—now as independent thought leader in the broad field of R&D and Innovation. 

Who Is the Ambidextrous Leader? 

Maria describes ambidextrous leadership as the ability to ‘perform’ and ‘transform’ at the same time and stay one step ahead as a result. She argues that to underpin growth in a complex and uncertain business environment, R&D leaders must master this ability with speed, agility, and scale. 

She describes this ability as having five key characteristics. The first is to be a thought leader, grafting broad conceptual thinking onto your core expertise. As she outlines: “This involves developing a higher-level perspective beyond the boundaries of the specific organization. A thought leader looks at the broader business and then connects this to their experiences and perspectives. This connection allows for interpreting the trends, transforming insights into foresight—thus enabling you to be one step ahead.” 

The second characteristic is to be science based and socially meaningful at the same time. This principle of connecting science with the social environment in which the business operates draws on the thinking and teaching of the Italian innovator Roberto Verganti. Maria cited two successful examples. First, the dizzying acceleration of telemedicine brought about by the pandemic, particularly in the field of vets and animal medicine. And second, the rise of mobile banking across both developed and developing countries, which flourished when mobile telephones became an inextricable part of life, even in the remotest and poorest parts of the world.  

Maria dramatized the significance of getting the combination of science based and social connection right through a story where the science was strong but socially the innovations did not take root. This concerned the development of Golden Rice, a staple food designed specifically to tackle the Vitamin A deficiency in Asia. A beneficial product, but, as Maria explains, “The main problem was the cultural acceptability of life sustaining rice in an unfamiliar color. People could not accept Golden Rice. As a result, the goal of a vitamin fortified staple food remains elusive. The lesson learned: it is imperative to understand how societal norms impact consumer demand for an innovation to be adopted, however groundbreaking the science behind it.” 

The third characteristic is to be able to ‘pivot’ your strategic thinking and direction, while taking ‘intelligent’ risks, thereby applying an agile approach to business and scientific problem solving. As Maria explains: “The traditional approach to innovation, certainly in large food corporations, is linear. The explosion of startups and the adoption of approaches, as Minimum Viable Product, requires a more nimble, agile—yet, of course, still safe and meeting regulatory requirements—approach to innovating at faster speeds. As leader you need to be able to develop a calculated assessment of how much research is required to go to market. Sometimes, the ‘standard battery of tests’ may not be required to get you into the market, and you can learn and adjust afterwards.” 

The fourth characteristic is to be a champion taking diverse teams towards a unified purpose. When you lead diverse teams, Maria argues, you nurture diversity of thought. She pulls from Aristotle in saying “It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.” Diverse teams, she stresses, take more initial effort to establish but they ultimately become far superior in performance and lasting impact. To illustrate this, she points to the digitalization of R&D organizations, where digital workers and traditional scientists are tasked to develop and drive collaboration across their respected functions, leveraging their respective differences. It allows them to reshape the mental model that governs their thinking and deliver against a common goal that they can both subscribe to. 

The final characteristic is the ability to win hearts and minds. This requires ‘soft’ leadership skills, such as deep listening, empathy, and understanding the needs of your associates. Ambidextrous leaders, Maria argues, need to be strongly committed to acquiring these skills, as they are not taught at university.  As Maria concludes: “It is all about servant leadership and this ties back to the need to champion diverse teams… It also requires the ability to ‘look inward’ to your personal development journey, sharing your wisdom but also being humble about what you don't know.”

Being in touch with your people and asking questions is also of critical importance—especially during times of uncertainty—as well as challenging the status quo, encouraging risk taking, and inspiring and building trust, Maria concludes. 

What Does an Ambidextrous Organization Look Like? 

But all this is only half of the challenge. Maria goes on to explore the characteristics of an ambidextrous organization. She submits three specific characteristics, which flow from her ambidextrous leadership principles discussed before, to develop such an organization. 

The first is the ability of the organization to navigate the ever-changing landscape of supply and demand, particularly as it is being transformed by environmental and societal requirements. According to Maria, R&D in the food sector has a key contribution to make in helping companies achieve net zero, in particular in the realm of recipe organization, Climate Smart Agriculture, and packaging. Taking packaging as an example, she points to newer Designs for Circularity (D4C), in achieving packaging that is recyclable, reusable, and/or compostable. 

The second characteristic—already touched on in the first podcast—is to leverage the collusion of traditional sciences with digital technologies and data to propel breakthroughs in a matter of months rather than years or decades. As she ponders: “Historically, we used psychology-based methods to understand consumer needs and design products and services to satisfy these needs. But we are now experiencing huge advances in neurobiology. What if we used a combined approach in conjunction with other disciplines to achieve a deeper emotional connection with our customers?” 

By way of illustration, Maria points to TreatTown, an online app created in 2020 by the Mars Wrigley Team to enable children to simulate trick or treating on Halloween online, at a time when the pandemic made it unsafe to do so in reality. She also cites the development of vet services telemedicine to support pets and pet parents during the COVID-19 years. 

Ambidextrous organizations have the ability to leverage data analytics to predict future trends and prescribe possible solutions. “Organizations are building AI-based algorithms to identify patterns and move into predictive analytics, for example to provide farmers with preventive tools that can help identify and offset upcoming meteorological conditions,” she explains. “New digital technologies, like process mining, introduce traceability capabilities delivering better transparency, which consumers both appreciate and are coming to expect.” 

It is imperative that people in the organization learn to appreciate the benefits of new technologies—like AI, automation, and machine learning—and embrace and adopt them. Maria points to the use of diagnostics and telemedicine in veterinary hospitals. A sample of a suspected tumor in an animal is scanned at extremely high resolution and then made available for the pathologist to evaluate. In these circumstances, Maria argues, AI can spot the same abnormalities that pathologists look for, faster and more accurately. “AI is not about replacing people,” she concludes. “It's about augmenting them, especially where there are bottlenecks in knowledge and interpretation.” 

All of this helps to contribute to the third characteristic of ambidextrous organizations: agility. As Maria explains, organizations that break down silos, bring cross-functional teams together, and emphasize collaboration, feedback and learning become almost by definition agile. 

She places great emphasis on developing multi-generational talent in a diverse and inclusive environment, nurturing and leveraging the resulting diversity of thought. She also places a premium on ensuring a combination of scientific and business savvy, as well as expecting rigor with speed. This way, risk taking resulting from fast development is balanced with the necessary due diligence. 

In conclusion, Maria states: “All these key concepts—ambidexterity, purpose, cognitive leadership, digitalization, innovation culture, and sustainability—need to be integrated to create an empowered organization in flow, which can succeed in performing and transforming at the same time and being one step ahead as a result.” 

Maria’s perspective on ambidextrous organizations is also outlined in a podcast by The Conference Board, part of the Insights Podcast Series.