The Future Organizational Design

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The future of organizational design or "strategic organization design" (Galbraith, 2012) applies to business with regional or functional levels. He suggests that organizational design will depend on an up-down design methodology as opposed to the alternative methodology that is a bottoms-up design approach. For instance, bottoms -up design is a social technique system approach that uses the technology, and applies it to levels of the organization. The Tops-down approach will be based on new technologies such as 3-dimensional devices. Galbraith suggests that the future will be shared by three main phenomena: (a) "concatenation" that involves ever-creasing complexity and interdependence as firms add new strategic emphasize and incorporate them into the structure. (b) "Big data" in the future that will be added to enterprise structures of the future, and (c) the law of "requisite variety (Ashley, 1956 as cited in Galbraith, 2012) will be included in the design. This law is taken from cybernetics, according to Galbraith, and states the number and variety of stake holders that have been increasing through a mass production and mass market to one of mass customization and segmented markets.

For example, a variety of units increases to manage entities in the organization. Galbraith explains that IBM used to have a simple direct sales force. Now the company employs 890 to market channels to reach customers and various departments and manage the relationships with channel partners and customers. Another phase of future organization is cited in which design- enabling technologies are recycled for a "Third Industrial Revolution" based on new technologies such as 3-dimensional printers that can fabricate a product anywhere in the world. In addition, new digital devices can eliminate expensive supply ...