IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/jorgde/v14y2025i3d10.1007_s41469-025-00189-1.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Role grouping experiments: a new method for studying organization re-design decisions

Author

Listed:
  • Nicolay Worren

    (Norwegian University of Life Sciences (NMBU))

  • Federico Cammelli

    (ETH
    University of Cambridge)

Abstract

We developed an experimental method to investigate organization design and grouping decisions more specifically. We demonstrate the method in a study with 285 participants. The participants were asked to group a set of nine roles into units using card-sorting. The role descriptions indicated that there were interdependencies between some of the roles. Participants’ grouping decisions were quantified and compared against an algorithmic solution that minimized coordination costs. It was found that a relatively small difference in task complexity between groups greatly affected participants’ performance. We discuss how the method can be extended to study a range of variables related to decision-making about organization design.

Suggested Citation

  • Nicolay Worren & Federico Cammelli, 2025. "Role grouping experiments: a new method for studying organization re-design decisions," Journal of Organization Design, Springer;Organizational Design Community, vol. 14(3), pages 169-187, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:jorgde:v:14:y:2025:i:3:d:10.1007_s41469-025-00189-1
    DOI: 10.1007/s41469-025-00189-1
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s41469-025-00189-1
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s41469-025-00189-1?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Marlo Raveendran, 2020. "Seeds of change: How current structure shapes the type and timing of reorganizations," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 41(1), pages 27-54, January.
    2. Nicolay Worren & Tore Christiansen & Kim Verner Soldal, 2020. "Using an algorithmic approach for grouping roles and sub-units," Journal of Organization Design, Springer;Organizational Design Community, vol. 9(1), pages 1-19, December.
    3. Kilmann, Ralph H., 1983. "The costs of organization structure: Dispelling the myths of independent divisions and organization-wide decision making," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 8(4), pages 341-357, October.
    4. Nicolay Worren & Jeroen Bree & William Zybach, 2019. "Organization design challenges: results from a practitioner survey," Journal of Organization Design, Springer;Organizational Design Community, vol. 8(1), pages 1-18, December.
    5. Ashish Arora & Michelle Gittelman & Sarah Kaplan & John Lynch & Will Mitchell & Nicolaj Siggelkow & Chi-Hyon Lee & Manuela N. Hoehn-Weiss & Samina Karim, 2016. "Grouping interdependent tasks: Using spectral graph partitioning to study complex systems," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 37(1), pages 177-191, January.
    6. Eppinger, Steven D. & Browning, Tyson R., 2012. "Design Structure Matrix Methods and Applications," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262017520, December.
    7. Christina Fang & Jeho Lee & Melissa A. Schilling, 2010. "Balancing Exploration and Exploitation Through Structural Design: The Isolation of Subgroups and Organizational Learning," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 21(3), pages 625-642, June.
    8. J. Daniel Sherman & Robert T. Keller, 2011. "Suboptimal Assessment of Interunit Task Interdependence: Modes of Integration and Information Processing for Coordination Performance," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 22(1), pages 245-261, February.
    9. von Hippel, Eric, 1990. "Task partitioning: An innovation process variable," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 19(5), pages 407-418, October.
    10. Jan W. Rivkin & Nicolaj Siggelkow, 2007. "Patterned Interactions in Complex Systems: Implications for Exploration," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 53(7), pages 1068-1085, July.
    11. Marlo Raveendran & Phanish Puranam & Massimo Warglien, 2016. "Object Salience in the Division of Labor: Experimental Evidence," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 62(7), pages 2110-2128, July.
    12. Yue Maggie Zhou, 2013. "Designing for Complexity: Using Divisions and Hierarchy to Manage Complex Tasks," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 24(2), pages 339-355, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Nicolay Worren & Tore Christiansen & Kim Verner Soldal, 2020. "Using an algorithmic approach for grouping roles and sub-units," Journal of Organization Design, Springer;Organizational Design Community, vol. 9(1), pages 1-19, December.
    2. Worren, Nicolay & Cammelli, Frederico & Christoffersen, Kolbjørn, 2020. "Organization design decisions: A card sorting approach," Working Paper Series 2-2020, Norwegian University of Life Sciences, School of Economics and Business.
    3. Dahai Li & Huan Wang & Yang Li, 2023. "Incentive Mechanisms for Thermal Power Generation Enterprises with Conflicting Tasks: Electricity Production versus Carbon Emission Reduction," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(13), pages 1-22, July.
    4. Dirk Martignoni & Thomas Keil & Markus Lang, 2020. "Focus in Searching Core–Periphery Structures," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 31(2), pages 266-286, March.
    5. Mohsen Jafari Songhori & Madjid Tavana & Takao Terano, 2020. "Product development team formation: effects of organizational- and product-related factors," Computational and Mathematical Organization Theory, Springer, vol. 26(1), pages 88-122, March.
    6. Eucman Lee & Ekin Ilseven & Phanish Puranam, 2023. "Scaling nonhierarchically: A theory of conflict‐free organizational growth with limited hierarchical growth," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 44(12), pages 3042-3064, December.
    7. MacCormack, Alan & Baldwin, Carliss & Rusnak, John, 2012. "Exploring the duality between product and organizational architectures: A test of the “mirroring” hypothesis," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 41(8), pages 1309-1324.
    8. Devarakonda, S.V. & Goossen, Martin & Mulotte, Louis, 2024. "The allocation of resource control within the corporate structure: Evidence from post-acquisition patent reassignments," Other publications TiSEM 4e9af8a0-0e1c-4780-a24e-6, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    9. Samina Karim & Chi‐Hyon Lee & Manuela N. Hoehn‐Weiss, 2023. "Task bottlenecks and resource bottlenecks: A holistic examination of task systems through an organization design lens," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 44(8), pages 1839-1878, August.
    10. Gatti, Corrado & Volpe, Loredana & Vagnani, Gianluca, 2015. "Interdependence among productive activities: Implications for exploration and exploitation," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 68(3), pages 711-722.
    11. Brice Dattée & James Barlow, 2017. "Multilevel Organizational Adaptation: Scale Invariance in the Scottish Healthcare System," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 28(2), pages 301-319, April.
    12. Christopher M. Schlick & Soenke Duckwitz & Sebastian Schneider, 2013. "Project dynamics and emergent complexity," Computational and Mathematical Organization Theory, Springer, vol. 19(4), pages 480-515, December.
    13. Ekin Ilseven & Phanish Puranam, 2025. "(Not) by chance? An application of Assembly Theory to infer non-randomness in organizational design," Journal of Organization Design, Springer;Organizational Design Community, vol. 14(2), pages 155-166, June.
    14. Khanna, Rajat, 2023. "Passing the torch of knowledge: Star death, collaborative ties, and knowledge creation," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 52(1).
    15. Baier, Elisabeth & Rammer, Christian & Schubert, Torben, 2015. "The Impact of Captive Innovation Offshoring on the Effectiveness of Organizational Adaptation," Journal of International Management, Elsevier, vol. 21(2), pages 150-165.
    16. Darío Blanco-Fernández & Stephan Leitner & Alexandra Rausch, 2023. "Interactions between the individual and the group level in organizations: The case of learning and group turnover," Central European Journal of Operations Research, Springer;Slovak Society for Operations Research;Hungarian Operational Research Society;Czech Society for Operations Research;Österr. Gesellschaft für Operations Research (ÖGOR);Slovenian Society Informatika - Section for Operational Research;Croatian Operational Research Society, vol. 31(4), pages 1087-1128, December.
    17. Juha Uotila, 2018. "Punctuated equilibrium or ambidexterity: dynamics of incremental and radical organizational change over time," Industrial and Corporate Change, Oxford University Press and the Associazione ICC, vol. 27(1), pages 131-148.
    18. Natalicchio, A. & Messeni Petruzzelli, A. & Garavelli, A.C., 2017. "Innovation problems and search for solutions in crowdsourcing platforms – A simulation approach," Technovation, Elsevier, vol. 64, pages 28-42.
    19. Andrea Pontiggia & Giovanni Fasano, 2021. "Data Analytics and Machine Learning paradigm to gauge performances combining classification, ranking and sorting for system analysis," Working Papers 05, Venice School of Management - Department of Management, Università Ca' Foscari Venezia.
    20. Abdelghani Es-Sajjade & Terry Wilkins, 2017. "Design, Perception and Behavior in the Innovation Era: Revisiting the Concept of Interdependence," Journal of Organization Design, Springer;Organizational Design Community, vol. 6(1), pages 1-12, December.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:jorgde:v:14:y:2025:i:3:d:10.1007_s41469-025-00189-1. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.