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Organizational Consultant: Creating a Useable Theory for Organizational Design

Author

Listed:
  • Helmy H. Baligh

    (The Fuqua School of Business, Box 90120, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina 27708-0120)

  • Richard M. Burton

    (The Fuqua School of Business, Box 90120, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina 27708-0120)

  • Børge Obel

    (Department of Management, Odense University, DK-5230, Odense M, Denmark)

Abstract

Organization theory is a positive science; organizational design is a normative science "concerned with how things ought to be, with devising structures to attain goals." The Organizational Consultant is a knowledge base expert system to help design organizations. That is, it takes facts about the environment, size, strategy, technology, ownership, and management preferences and applies the knowledge base to recommend the design structure and properties such as complexity, formalization, centralization, and span of control, among others. Organization theory is comprised of numerous positive contingency theories, which are not integrated. The main issue is to create a comprehensive and consistent knowledge base from what we know, i.e., create a useful synthesis. We utilize four fit criteria as a guide: contingency fit, design parameter fit, situation fit, and total parameter fit. Contingency fit demands that the knowledge base of "if-then" rules follow what we know from the literature. Design parameter fit requires a balance, or weighting, among the supporting and opposing design recommendations. Situation fit assures us that the situation itself is not inconsistent. Finally, total design fit requires that it is useable and helpful to recommend structure and properties to attain goals. The development of the Organizational Consultant is a continuing validation exercise. The size of an organization is an important design contingency. Yet, an operational definition of size for design purposes has been wanting. We discuss how a useful definition of size was developed for the Organizational Consultant. We describe the development of the Organizational Consultant---a knowledge-based expert system that utilizes a synthesis of the elements of organizational contingency, theory through a validation process. The four fit criteria were applied to guide the development process.

Suggested Citation

  • Helmy H. Baligh & Richard M. Burton & Børge Obel, 1996. "Organizational Consultant: Creating a Useable Theory for Organizational Design," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 42(12), pages 1648-1662, December.
  • Handle: RePEc:inm:ormnsc:v:42:y:1996:i:12:p:1648-1662
    DOI: 10.1287/mnsc.42.12.1648
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. A. Georges L. Romme & Gerard Endenburg, 2006. "Construction Principles and Design Rules in the Case of Circular Design," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 17(2), pages 287-297, April.
    2. Marc J. Epstein & Marie‐Josée Roy, 2007. "Implementing a corporate environmental strategy: establishing coordination and control within multinational companies," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 16(6), pages 389-403, September.
    3. Myong-Hun Chang & Joseph E. Harrington, 2000. "Centralization vs. Decentralization in a Multi-Unit Organization: A Computational Model of a Retail Chain as a Multi-Agent Adaptive System," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 46(11), pages 1427-1440, November.
    4. Richard M. Burton & Jørgen Lauridsen & Børge Obel, 2002. "Return on Assets Loss from Situational and Contingency Misfits," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 48(11), pages 1461-1485, November.
    5. Zhiang Lin, 2000. "Organizational Performance Under Critical Situations—Exploring the Role of Computer Modeling in Crisis Case Analyses," Computational and Mathematical Organization Theory, Springer, vol. 6(3), pages 277-310, September.
    6. Daniel E. O'Leary, 1997. "Validation of Computational Models Based on Multiple Heterogeneous Knowledge Sources," Computational and Mathematical Organization Theory, Springer, vol. 3(2), pages 75-90, June.
    7. Timothy N. Carroll & Thomas J. Gormley & Vincent J. Bilardo & Richard M. Burton & Keith L. Woodman, 2006. "Designing a New Organization at NASA: An Organization Design Process Using Simulation," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 17(2), pages 202-214, April.
    8. Kingshuk K. Sinha & Andrew H. Van de Ven, 2005. "Designing Work Within and Between Organizations," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 16(4), pages 389-408, August.
    9. Zakaria Elkhwesky, 2022. "A systematic and major review of proactive environmental strategies in hospitality and tourism: Looking back for moving forward," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 31(7), pages 3274-3301, November.
    10. Richard M. Burton & Borge Obel, 2013. "Design rules for dynamic organization design: the contribution of computational modeling," Chapters, in: Anna Grandori (ed.), Handbook of Economic Organization, chapter 13, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    11. A.P. Barsukov & N.V. Bukhov, 2019. "Development of Company’s Management Framework on the Basis of Value Chain," International Journal of Economics & Business Administration (IJEBA), International Journal of Economics & Business Administration (IJEBA), vol. 0(Special 1), pages 101-114.
    12. Král, Pavel & Králová, Věra, 2016. "Approaches to changing organizational structure: The effect of drivers and communication," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 69(11), pages 5169-5174.
    13. Stephan Leitner, 2023. "Designing organizations for bottom-up task allocation: The role of incentives," Papers 2301.00410, arXiv.org.
    14. Patrick Müller & David Gazsi, 2023. "Populist Capture of Foreign Policy Institutions: The Orbán Government and the De‐Europeanization of Hungarian Foreign Policy," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 61(2), pages 397-415, March.
    15. Julian Birkinshaw & Robert Nobel & Jonas Ridderstråle, 2002. "Knowledge as a Contingency Variable: Do the Characteristics of Knowledge Predict Organization Structure?," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 13(3), pages 274-289, June.
    16. Saleh Alkhodhair & Ahmed Alsanad & Khaled Alghathbar & Abdu Gumaei, 2020. "Key Quality Attributes for Computational and Sustainable Higher Education Strategy Implementation in Saudi Arabia," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(5), pages 1-23, March.
    17. Zhiang Lin & Chun Hui, 1997. "Adapting to the Changing Environment: A Theoretical Comparison of Decision Making Proficiency of Lean and Mass Organization Systems," Computational and Mathematical Organization Theory, Springer, vol. 3(2), pages 113-142, June.

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