This paper demonstrates how and under what conditions small and medium-sized enterprises in Central and Eastern Europe can build and manage ambidexterity. We illustrate how an exploitation-driven insurance firm complemented its exploitative core business in Central Eu-rope with exploratory activities (i.e. a new venture) in Eastern Europe to create ambidexterity across two geographically dispersed business units (BUs). We show how the firm achieved ambidexterity by elaborating on the BUs’ micro-political bargaining power and BU leaders changing their units’ mandates and adapting organisational learning to balance exploitation and exploration.