The problem of designing, managing, and coordinating the efforts of different parts of complex organizations is central to the management and organizations literature. A central element, in turn, of Simon's (1962) argument, which provides a foundation for understanding complex organizations, is...

The paper examines the allocation of inventive effort in complex product systems. I argue that complex product systems (e.g., personal computers) are distinguished by functional interaction among several components each guided by a relatively autonomous bundle of technical and economic...