The Evolution of Organizational Structure and Technology in a Developing Country

This article examines an evolutionary pattern of relationships among technology, structure, environment and other contextual variables in 31 manufacturing organizations in a developing country. The results of bivariate analyses show that younger firms exhibit more mechanistic structure, a higher degree in operations technology adaptability, a lower degree in indigenous technical capability, a lower degree of innovation, and smaller scale than older firms. The results also show that younger firms perceive suppliers as more important, while older firms perceive customers and competitors as more important. Multivariate discriminant analysis also supports the above findings in general. The pattern observed in a developing country is quite different from that observed in developed countries, but firms in both developed and developing countries appear to adopt organizational designs viable to their own environment. The results of the study suggest ways in which international operations should be designed to correspond to their local environment.