Hypothesis Testing of Edge Organizations: Modeling the C2 Organization Design Space

Abstract

The Edge represents a fresh approach to organizational design. It appears to be particularly appropriate in the context of modern military warfare, but also raises issues regarding comparative performance of alternate organizational designs. Building upon prior C2 research, we seek to understand the comparative performance of the Edge and all organizatinal forms, across 21st Century and all mission-environmental conditions, and hence characterize the entire organization design space systematically. Leveraging recent advances in computational organizational theory, we extend our campaign of experimentation to specify six, diverse, archetypal organization forms from theory, and evaluate their comparative performance empirically. Results confirm that no single orgnizational form is "best" for all circumstances; highlight contingent circumstances for which the Edge and other kinds of organizations perform relatively better than one another; and elucidate specific performance measures that provide multidimensional insight into different aspects of organizational performance. This research grounds the Edge organization firmly in well-established organization theory, and provides empirical support for and against claims regarding this novel organizational form, particularly in terms of agility. Additionally, through organizational modeling and analysis, we aarticulate an organizational design space for the first time. We discuss the model, experimental setup and results in considerable detail, and offer theoretical implications for the organization scholar and actionable guidance for the C2 practitioner.