Bricolage Strategy and SME Performance: The Paradoxical Role of Organizational Ambidexterity and Entrepreneurial Leadership

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) operate under conditions of chronic resource constraints, which makes it important to study strategies capable of transforming available resources into sustainable financial outcomes. One such strategy is entrepreneurial bricolage - the unconventional recombination of existing resources to address organizational challenges. This article examines the impact of bricolage on SME performance, evaluates the mediating role of organizational ambidexterity, and investigates the moderating effect of entrepreneurial leadership. The empirical basis consists of data from a large-scale survey of Russian SMEs combined with objective financial indicators; the model was estimated using the PROCESS macro (Models 4 and 14), controlling for firm characteristics, industry environment, and managerial profiles. The empirical analysis confirms that bricolage has a significant positive effect on SME performance and fosters the development of organizational ambidexterity. At the same time, ambidexterity negatively affects firm performance, which paradoxically results in an indirect negative effect. Entrepreneurial leadership moderates this relationship, and its high level mitigates the adverse impact of ambidexterity. The findings show that in the absence of strong leadership, ambidexterity may reduce the effectiveness of resource-constrained firms. The results contribute to entrepreneurship theory and offer practical implications for SMEs seeking innovation-driven growth.