The Influence of Communication Technologies on Organizational Structure

The article presents a conceptual model that hypothesizes how information technologies may assist in accomplishing two key functions of communication in research and development. The first function is to provide state-of-the-art information on the organizational technologies that are employed. This function is typically carried out via a functional organization structure, which groups together individuals with similar technical specialties. The second function is to accomplish coordination across technical specialties applied to the same task or project. This is typically accomplished by a project form of organization, which groups together individuals working on the same task. The cost of selecting one structure is the loss of the advantages of the other. Information technologies, such as electronic mail, computer conferencing, bulletin boards, and document search and retrieval systems, may be employed to augment the chosen structure and compensate to some degree for its limitations.

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