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Organizational ambidexterity is widely understood to be critical for a firm's sustained success and survival. Yet, how firms achieve organizational ambidexterity is still not well understood. In particular, we lack a clear understanding of the micro-foundations of organizational ambidexterity. Ambidextrous organizations require multi-level solutions grounded in individual action to address vexing challenges associated with exploratory and exploitative efforts in dynamic environments. Building on this insight, we argue that organizational ambidexterity is a dynamic and flexible-laden phenomenon, and we locate flexibility at the level of individuals, units and organizations. We therefore develop the argument that functional flexibility i.e. strategic skill flexibility and employee empowerment serve as the micro-foundations of organizational ambidexterity. We test our hypotheses using survey data from over 564 firms operating in the Port of Rotterdam. Our findings reveal that both strategic skill flexibility and employee empowerment act as important micro-level antecedents of organizational ambidexterity. Specifically, we find that the interplay between strategic skill flexibility and employee empowerment nurtures micro-foundational sources of organizational ambidexterity in dynamic environments. The perspective developed in this article opens up promising research avenues to examine how firms manage ambidexterity through certain micro-foundations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]