Over the last few years, business simulation games (BSGs) in higher education have attracted attention. BSGs tend to actively engage students with course material, promoting higher engagement and motivation and enabling learning outcomes. Increasingly, researchers are trying to explore the full potential of these games with an upsurge of research in the BSG field in recent years. There is a need to understand the current state of research and future research opportunities; however, there is a lack of recent systematic literature reviews in BSG literature. This study addresses this gap by systematically compiling online empirical research from January 2015 to April 2022. We followed PRISMA guidelines to identify fifty-seven (57) papers reporting empirical evidence of the effectiveness of BSGs in teaching and learning. Findings showed that BSGs improve learning outcomes such as knowledge acquisition, cognitive and interactive skills, and behaviour. The review also summarises different issues concerning the integration of BSGs into the curriculum, learning theories used in the selected studies, and assessment methods used to evaluate student achievement in learning outcomes. The findings of this review summarise the current research activities and indicate existing deficiencies and potential research directions that can be used as the basis for future research into the use of BSGs in higher education.

The COVID‐19 pandemic accelerated digitalisation across higher education (HE), compelling employees to adapt rapidly to online work environments. More specifically, it explains how crisis‐induced improvisations were either left as temporary workarounds or, through learning, transformed into sustained, digitally enabled work practices and microinnovations. This qualitative study examines how employees in Australian HE administration engage in adaptive ambidextrous technology‐use behaviours, balancing the exploitation of familiar tools and the exploration of new functionalities, underpinned by bricolage and adaptive performance. Using an interpretive qualitative approach, 38 semistructured interviews were thematically analysed with NVivo. The findings reveal that bricolage served as a catalyst for ambidextrous technology use, whereas adaptive performance behaviours and self‐directed and peer‐supported learning pathways mediated the sustainability of this use. These behaviours enhanced work‐related outcomes, including job satisfaction, productivity, error reduction, turnaround speed and task completion time. The study identifies innovative work practices as a novel outcome, where employees developed ‘microinnovations’ by reconfiguring workflows, automating tasks and integrating digital tools in new ways. This insight extends adaptive performance theory into the domain of creativity, bridging ambidexterity research with innovation management. The resulting adaptive‐innovative ambidexterity framework refines prior conceptualisations by situating bricolage as a catalyst, learning pathways as mediators and innovation as a distinct outcome. The study contributes theoretically by advancing microlevel understanding of adaptive ambidextrous technology use, and practically by highlighting how organisations can design digital strategies that foster both adaptation and innovation in postpandemic digital workplaces.