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This paper explores the ramifications of external dependence for work-unit design and efficiency. Previous studies at the work-unit level have been largely concerned with task elements alone as the most important contingency for design. Two rival formulations of a dependence-contingent model are derived and contrasted with the more familiar task-contingent propositions. Tests using data from 230 employment security agency units show that, if task is controlled, both horizontal and vertical dependence are important predictors of more organic work-unit designs. In addition, failure to relate design to horizontal dependence is related to lower efficiency.

Organizational design research has largely ignored the effects of inertia on competitive response, despite the centrality of the concept in theories of organizational evolution. In evolutionary research, inertia is frequently invoked as an explanation for why organizations delay or completely fail to respond to changes in competitive pressure. Inertia is thus seen as a primary antecedent of strategic consequences such as impaired performance and organizational mortality. Such explanations, however, cannot be tested empirically without a satisfactory method for measuring levels of inertia. This paper draws on techniques from catastrophe theory to explore a means of assessing organizational inertia by modelling organizational response to competitive pressure. Specifically, this paper looks at competitive response in terms of the aggressiveness of an organization's strategy, and models this as a function of environmental pressure and the inhibiting or enabling effects of organizational design. This paper also reveals a method for measuring the level of inertia associated with organizational response to environmental pressure. The proposed methodology takes into account the rich, multidimensional nature of these constructs and accounts for effects that delay response in the face of radical change in competitive pressure. The method also captures both incremental and radical shifts in competitive response intensity. Key benefits of the methodology include the ability to measure inertia and to assess the effects of different design elements on this measure. It thus provides a means by which researchers can enrich their understanding of the antecedents of inertia and test its effects on such outcomes as performance and survival. Data from a savings and loan association illustrate the application of this methodology.

An analytic framework which relates cultural variables to structural and technoecono mic factors, both inside and outside the organization, is derived from the methods employed by cultural anthropologists to generate a functional theory. The framework divides variables into two classes — social and organization, and along three different subsystems — technoeconomic, structural, and cultural. Useful in reconciling previously inconsistent or incompatible theories of organization, the framework is offered as a coordination device to integrate the results of divergent approaches to organizational culture studies.

Unit morale is an important but little researched criterion of work-unit performance. Data from 382 employment security agency work-units were used to test a task-contingent model of work-unit design and morale. Universal and contingent effects of unit task and design on unit morale were examined. After controlling for the main effects of task uncertainty and individual dimensions of design, a multivariate measure of fit was found to be the only significant predictor of unit morale. These findings differ from previous research and show that a systems'approach to the examination of fit may be better at detecting contingency relationships than the pairwise approaches that have been attempted previously.