Presentation to the 71st Military Operations Research Society Symposium. Marine Corps Base Quantico, VA. 10-12 June, 2003.How do teams cope with a misalignment between their organizational structures and mission
requirements? Through a series of empirical and modeling efforts, our long-term goal is to
understand the nature of organizational congruence, and to predict and measure the effects of
a lack of congruence on the behaviors of organizations as they strive to adapt. In this paper,
we present a series of lessons learned based on a pilot experiment in which we explored the
performance of two organizations (functional and divisional) performing a single mission,
which in this case, was not designed to favor a particular organization. The lessons learned
here suggest a variety of empirical strategies to further our investigations, including measures
of performance, rigorous attention to team and mission definitions, and precise planning of
training structure. Our findings suggest that each of these factors has the potential to
profoundly influence the results, reflecting the multiple factors that shape team performance.The research reported here was sponsored by the Office of Naval Research, Contract No. N00014-99-C-0255,under the direction of Gerald MaleckiThe research reported here was sponsored by the Office of Naval Research, Contract No. N00014-99-C-0255,under the direction of Gerald Maleck
