The term "organic" suggests that, like living things, organizations change their structures, roles, and processes to respond and adapt to their environments. Burns and Stalker noted in The Management of Innovation that organic structures are appropriate in unstable, turbulent, unpredictable environments and for non-routine tasks and technologies. For organizations coping with such uncertainty, finding appropriate, effective, and timely responses to environmental challenges is of critical importance. Organic organizations are characterized by:

• decentralization
• flexible, broadly defined jobs
• interdependence among employees and units
• multi-directional communication
• employee initiative
• relatively few and broadly defined rules, regulations, procedures, and processes
• employee participation in problem solving and decision making, often interactively and in groups

In organic organizations, the emphasis is on effectiveness, problem solving, responsiveness, flexibility, adaptability, creativity, and innovation. Such an organization is able to respond in a timely manner to environmental change because employees are empowered to be creative, to...