Organizational Architecture

Organizational architecture has two very different meanings. In one sense it literally refers to the organization in its built environment and in another sense it refers to architecture metaphorically, as a structure which fleshes out the organizations.

• Organizational architecture or organizational space: the influence of the spatial environment on humans in and around organizations.
• Organizational architecture or organization design: the creation of roles, processes, and formal reporting relationships in an organization.

Organizational space describes the influence of the spatial environment on the health, the mind, and the behavior of humans in and around organizations (Mobach, 2009). It is an area of research in which interdisciplinarity is a central perspective. It draws from management, organization and architecture (Dale en Burrell, 2008) added with knowledge from, for instance, environmental psychology, social medicine, or spatial science. In essence, it may be regarded as a special field of expertise of organization studies and change management (people) applied to architecture. This perspective on organizational architecture is elaborated in organizational space.

Organization design or architecture of an organization as a metaphor provides the framework through which an organization aims to realize its core qualities as specified in its vision statement. It provides the infrastructure into which business processes are deployed and ensures that the organization's core qualities are realized across the business processes deployed within the organization. In this way organizations aim to consistently realize their core qualities across the services they offer to their clients. This perspective on organizational architecture is elaborated below.