Complexity theory and organizations

Complexity theory has been used extensively in the field of strategic management and organizational studies, sometimes called complexity strategy or complex adaptive organization on the internet or in popular press.

Overview

Broadly speaking, complexity theory is used in these domains to understand how organizations or firms adapt to their environments. The theory treats organizations and firms as collections of strategies and structures. When the organization or firm shares the properties of other complex adaptive systems - which is often defined as consisting of a small number of relatively simple and partially connected structures -- they are more likely to adapt to their environment and, thus, survive. Complexity theoretic thinking has been present in strategy and organizational studies since their inception as academic disciplines.

History

For instance, early strategy and organizational theorists emphasized complexity-like thinking including:

• Herbert Simon's interest in decomposable systems and computational complexity.
• Karl Weick's loose coupling theory and interest in causal dependencies
• Burns and Stalker's contrast between organic and mechanistic structures
• Charles Perrow's interest in the link between complex organization and catastrophic accidents
• James March's contrast between exploration and exploitation

More recently work by organizational scholars and their colleagues have added greatly to our understanding of how concepts from the complexity sciences can be used to understand strategy and organizations. The work of Dan Levinthal, Jan Rivkin, Nicolaj Siggelkow, Kathleen Eisenhardt, Nelson Repenning, Phil Anderson and their research groups have been influential in their use of ideas from the complexity sciences in the fields of strategic management and organizational studies.

See also

• Complex adaptive system
• Complex system
• Complexity
• Complexity theory

Further reading

• Anderson, P. 1999. Complexity Theory and Organization Science Organization Science. 10(3): 216-232. [1]

• Axelrod, R. A., & Cohen, M. D., 2000. Harnessing Complexity: Organizational Implications of a Scientific Frontier. New York: The Free Press [2].

• Yaneer Bar-Yam (2005). Making Things Work: Solving Complex Problems in a Complex World. Cambridge, MA: Knowledge Press [3]

• Brown, S. L., & Eisenhardt, K. M. 1997. The Art of Continuous Change: Linking Complexity Theory and Time-paced Evolution in Relentlessly Shifting Organizations. Administrative Science Quarterly, 42: 1-34 [4].

• Burns, S., & Stalker, G. M. 1961. The Management of Innovation. London: Tavistock Publications [5].

• Davis, J. P., Eisenhardt, K. M., & Bingham, C. B. 2008. Complexity Theory, Market Dynamism, and the Strategy of Simple Rules, Stanford Technology Ventures Program working paper [6].

• Dombkins, D.H. (2007). Complex Project Management. Booksurge: Amazon Group. ISBN 9781419676901.

• Gell-Mann, M. 1994. The Quark and the Jaguar: Adventures in the Simple and the Complex. New York: WH Freeman [7].

• Kauffman, S. 1993. The Origins of Order. New York, NY: Oxford University Press. [8].

• Levinthal, D. 1997. Adaptation on Rugged Landscapes. Management Science, 43: 934-950 [9].

• March, J. G. 1991. Exploration and Exploitation in Organizational Learning. Organization Science, 2(1): 71-87 [10].

• McKelvey, B. 1999. Avoiding Complexity Catastrophe in Coevolutionary Pockets: Strategies for Rugged Landscapes. Organization Science, 10(3): 249-321 [11].

• McMillan, E. 2004 Complexity, Organizations and Change. Routledge.ISBN 041531447X Hardback. ISBN 041539502X Paperback

• Moffat, James. 2003. Complexity Theory and Network Centric Warfare. [12]

• Perrow, C. Complex Organizations: A Critical Essay Scott, Forseman & Co., Glenville, Illinois [13].

• Rivkin, J., W. 2000. Imitation of Complex Strategies. Management Science, 46(6): 824-844 [14].

• Rivkin, J. and Siggelkow, N. 2003. Balancing Search and Stability: Interdependencies Among Elements of Organizational Design. Management Science, 49, pp. 290-311 [15].

• Rudolph, J., & Repenning, N. 2002. Disaster Dynamics: Understanding the Role of Quantity in Organizational Collapse. Administrative Science Quarterly, 47: 1-30 [16].

• Schilling, M. A. 2000. Toward a General Modular Systems Theory and its Applicability to Interfirm Product Modularity. Academy of Management Review, 25(2): 312-334 [17].

• Siggelkow, S. 2002. Evolution toward Fit. Administrative Science Quarterly, 47, pp. 125-159 [18].

• Simon, H. 1996 (1969; 1981) The Sciences of the Artificial (3rd Edition) MIT Press [19].

• Smith, Edward. 2006. Complexity, Networking, and Effects Based Approaches to Operations] by Edward[[20]

• Weick, K. E. 1976. Educational Organizations as loosely coupled systems. Administrative Science Quarterly, 21(1): 1-19 [21].

External links

The following include a variety of places where complexity science is done in the areas of strategy and organizational studies:

• The Santa Fe Institute and their Summer School
• The UCLA Human Complex Systems Program
• The Center for the Study of Complex Systems at the University of Michigan
• The Management Department in the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania
• The Stanford Technology Ventures Program in the Engineering School at Stanford University
• The Organizational Studies and Strategy Group at the MIT Sloan School of Management
• The Strategy Unit at Harvard Business School
• The Complexity Group at the London School of Economics
• The New England Complex Systems Institute
• The Complexity Science Research Centre, Open University,UK