Author Description

The authors examine how the organizational structure of commercial corporations has changed over the past 10-15 years, in order to understand what lessons from that experience might be applied to the U.S. Army. Many of these changes have been greatly facilitated by advances in information technology, and part of the project's goal was to discover how the ongoing information revolution might make organizational innovations possible. The authors argue that the principles of flat organization and decentralized leadership are already present to a degree in Army doctrine, but in practice the Army tends to be excessively hierarchical. The problem is particularly severe in the TDA Army, as well as in the TO&E Army under peacetime conditions. The report suggests a number of ways to minimize the effects of excessive command hierarchy.