Designing Organizations: Strategy, Structure, and Process at the Business Unit and Enterprise Levels, 3rd Edition

Chapter 7

Designing the Network Organization

Another variation on the single-business functional organization is the network organization. Miles and Snow (1986) began describing this type of organization in the mid-1980s, when industries were transforming from vertical integration into horizontal industry models. It was also a time when companies were beginning to outsource activities and downsize. Many companies evaluated their supply chains as well. As they questioned their ability to perform activities along their value chains, they realized that they could not be good at everything along the chain, and yet to be competitive, they had to be good at everything along it. The network organization arose when a company began performing and owning ...