Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-jbqgn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-06-16T06:38:36.787Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

ORGANIZATION DESIGN IN MOTION: DESIGNING AN ORGANIZATION FOR AGILITY

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 July 2021

Saeedeh Shafiee Kristensen ,
Mitra Shafiee  and
Sara Shafiee
Saeedeh Shafiee Kristensen
Affiliation:
Department of Management, School of Business and Social Sciences, Aarhus University (AU); Milestones Systems A/S
Mitra Shafiee
Affiliation:
Science and Research Branch, Faculty of Management and Economics, Islamic Azad University, Tehran
Sara Shafiee*
Affiliation:
Department of Mechanical Engineer
*
Shafiee, Sara, Technical University of Denmark (DTU), Department of Mechanical Engineering, Denmark, shafieesara7@gmail.com

Abstract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

Increasingly competitive and multifaceted business landscapes and the accelerating pace of innovation require organizations to build in-house capability to evaluate the effectiveness of their design and redesign their organizational structure to drive agile product development. The purpose of this research is to examine how the ability of an organization to implement agile is affected by the organization design. A case study based on 35 semi-structured interviews and field observations at a leading, large-size, Danish software development company was carried out. Adopting the contingency perspective, this paper presents the relevant organizational elements that can increase organizational agility and how the companies can leverage the advantages of the design. Accordingly, it provides a framework that compromises eighteen core organizational practices grouped into four categories (organizational structure and governance, culture and people, IT tools and data infrastructure, and processes) to understand the effect of organization design on agile product development.

Keywords

Organizational processesCommunicationOrganisation of product development
Type
Article
Information
Proceedings of the Design Society , Volume 1: ICED21 , August 2021 , pp. 2349 - 2358
Creative Commons
Creative Common License - CCCreative Common License - BYCreative Common License - NCCreative Common License - ND
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is unaltered and is properly cited. The written permission of Cambridge University Press must be obtained for commercial re-use or in order to create a derivative work.
Copyright
The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press

References

Alavi, S., Dzuraidah, A. W., Norhamidi, M. and Arbab Shirani, B. (2014), “Organic Structure and Organisational Learning as the Main Antecedents of Workforce Agility”, International Journal of Production Research, Vol. 52 No. 21, pp. 6273–6295. http://doi.org/10.1080/00207543.2014.919420CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bennett, N. and Lemoine, J.G. (2014), “What VUCA Really Means for You”, Harvard Business Review, http://doi.org/2014/01/what-vuca-really-means-for-youGoogle Scholar
Bower, J. L. and Christensen, C. M. (1995), “Disruptive Technologies: Catching the Wave”, Harvard Business Review, Vol. 73 No. 1, pp. 43–53.Google Scholar
Brady, T. and Davies, A. (2004), “Building Project Capabilities: From Exploratory to Exploitative Learning”, Organization Studies, Vol. 25 No. 9, pp. 1601–1621.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Burton, R. M., Håkonsson, R. M., Nickerson, J., Puranam, P., Workiewicz, M. and Zenger, T (2017), “GitHub: exploring the space between boss-less and hierarchical forms of organizing”, Journal of Organization Design, Vol. 6 No1, pp. 10. https://doi.org/10.1186/s41469-017-0020-3CrossRefGoogle Scholar
De Smet, A., Lackey, G., Lurie, M. and Murarka, M. (2018), The Five Trademarks of Agile Organizations, McKinsey&Company.Google Scholar
Donaldson, L. (2001), The Contingency Theory of Organizations, Sage Publications.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ebrahim, Sh., Krishnakanthan, K. and Thaker, Sh. (2018), Agile Compendium, McKinsey&Company.Google Scholar
Fjeldstad, Ø.D., Snow, CC, Miles, R.E. and Lettl, C. (2012), “The Architecture of Collaboration”, Strategic Management Journal, Vol. 33 No. 6, pp. 734–750. https://doi.org/10.1002/smj.1968CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gibson, C. and Birkinshaw, J. (2004), “The Antecedents, Consequences, and Mediating Role of Organizational Ambidexterity”, The Academy of Management Journal, Vol. 47 No. 2, pp. 209–226. Retrieved December 6, 2020, from: (http://www.jstor.org/stable/20159573)Google Scholar
Hansen, N.K., Wolfgang, H. G. and Swart, J. (2017). ”HRM in Dynamic Environments: Exploitative, Exploratory, and Ambidextrous HR Architectures”, The International Journal of Human Resource Management, https://doi.org/10.1080/09585192.2016.127CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Heracleous, L. and Oliver, D. (2018), “Organizational design for agility“, In: Prange, Ch. and Heracleous, L. (Eds), Agility X: How organizations thrive in unpredictable times, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. (114–136).Google Scholar
Jacobides, M. (2007), “The Inherent Limits of Organizational Structure and the Unfulfilled Role of Hierarchy: Lessons from a Near-war”, Organization Science, Vol. 18 No. 3, pp. 455–477. https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.1070.0278CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kristensen, S. Sh, . (2019), Rethinking the Potential Organization of Technology Group at Milestone, Master Thesis, Technical University of Denmark.Google Scholar
Kristensen, S. Sh. and Shafiee, S. (2019), “Rethinking organization design to enforce organizational agility”, paper presented at The 11th Symposium on Competence-Based Strategic Management, University of Stuttgart, 26-27 September 2019.Google Scholar
Laloux, F. and Wilber, K. (2014), Reinventing Organizations: A Guide to Creating Organizations inspired by the Next Stage in Human Consciousness, Nelson Parker.Google Scholar
Lawrence, P.R. and Lorsch, J. W. (1967), Organization and Environment, Boston, MA: Harvard Business School, Division of Research Cambridge, Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
McDowell, T., Agarwal, D., Miller, D., Okamoto, T. and Page, T. (2016), “Organizational Design: The Rise of Teams”, Deloitte Global Human Capital Trends 2016.Google Scholar
Milgrom, P. and Roberts, J. (1995), “Complementarities and Fit: Strategy, Structure, and Organizational Change in Manufacturing”, Journal of Accounting and Economics, Vol. 19 No. 2, pp. 179–208. https://doi.org/10.1016/0165-4101(94)00382-FCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mintzberg, H. (1992), Structure in Fives: Designing Effective Organizations, Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.Google Scholar
Moreira, M. E. (2017), The agile enterprise: Building and running agile organizations, Apress, Berkeley, CA.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nijssen, M. and Paauwe, J. (2012), “HRM in Turbulent Times: How to Achieve Organizational Agility?”, The International Journal of Human Resource Management, Vol. 23 No. 16, pp. 3315–3335, https://doi.org/10.1080/09585192.2012.689160CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Page, T., Rahnema, A. Murphy, T. and McDowell, T. (2016), Unlocking the Flexible Organization: Organizational sesign for an Uncertain Future. Deloitte.Google Scholar
Rey, C., Pitta, N., Ramonas, D., Sotok, P. (2019), “Agile Purpose: Overcoming Bureaucracy”, In: Rey, C., Bastons, M. and Sotok, P. (Eds), Purpose-driven Organizations, Palgrave Macmillan, Cham, pp. (75–86). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-17674-7_6CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Robinson, B. (2015), Holacracy: The New Management System for a Rapidly Changing World. Henry Holt and Co.Google Scholar
ScaledAgile. (2015), Lean-Agile Mindset Abstract. Available at: (http://www.scaledagileframework.com/lean-agile-mindset/)Google Scholar
Shafiee, S., Haug, A., Shafiee Kristensen, S. and Hvem, L. (2020), “Application of Design Thinking to Product Configuration Project”, Journal of Manufacturing Technology Management, Vol. 32 No.1, pp. 219–241.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tallon, P.P. and Pinsonneault, A. (2011), “Competing Perspectives on the Link between Strategic Information Technology Alignment and Organizational Agility: Insights from a Mediation Model”, MIS Quarterly, Vol. 35, pp. 463–486. https://doi.org/10.2307/23044052CrossRefGoogle Scholar
The Corporate Rebels, (2018), Busting the myth: organizations with no hierarchy don't exist. Available at: (https://corporate-rebels.com/busting-the-myth/)Google Scholar
The Corporate Rebels, (2019), 5 ways to create a radically transparent work culture. Available at: (https://corporate-rebels.com/transparent-work-culture/)Google Scholar
Thomas, K.W. and Velthouse, B.A. (1990), “Cognitive Elements of Empowerment: An “Interpretive” Model of Intrinsic Task Motivation”, Academy of Management Review, Vol. 15, pp. 666–681.Google Scholar
Trkman, P. (2009), “The Critical Success factors of business process management”, International Journal of Information Management, Vol. 30, pp. 125–134. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijinfomgt.2009.07.003CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wawarta, C.H. and Heracleous, L. (2018), “Playfulness and Agile Strategizing”, In: Prange, Ch. and Heracleous, L. (Eds), Agility X: How organizations thrive in unpredictable times, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. (99–113).Google Scholar
Wigger, K. and Agnete Alsos, G. (2018), “Resource Mobilization for Temporary Opportunities”, Academy of Management Proceedings, AOM Chicago.Google Scholar
Winter, S.G. (2003), “Understanding Dynamic Capabilities”, Strategic Management Journal, Vol. 24, pp. 991–995. https://doi.org/10.1002/smj.318CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Yin, R.K. (2013), Case Study Research: Design and Methods, 5th ed. Thousand Oaks: Sage Publication.Google Scholar