Identifying Situational Factors Affecting Leaders' Tolerance of Ambiguity Using Content Analysis Approach

Tolerance of ambiguity is one of the important competencies of leaders that plays a significant role in the effectiveness of their decisions in ambiguous conditions. This study aimed at identifying the situational factors affecting the competency of leaders' ambiguity tolerance, developing a comprehensive model of these factors, and also provide solutions to improve this competency based on these factors. The statistical population of this study, which is conducted using qualitative research of thematic analysis, comprised academic and executive experts of the Iranian Ministry of Petroleum who were experienced in decision-making and management in ambiguities. Sampling of this study was done purposefully by snowball method. The data were collected through interviews with 19 experts and analyzed via three-step coding process and thematic network analysis. The reliability of the research was also confirmed via calculation of the kappa coefficient. The findings were given to three academic experts and were approved. The situational factors affecting the leaders' ambiguity tolerance were categorized into two comrehenstive themes of internal organizational factors (job characteristics and organizational characteristics) and external organizational factors (industry characteristics, cultural factors, and social factors). The findings of this study showed that internal and external organizational factors affect the leaders' ambiguity tolerance.