Company structure and market strategy

The importance of the relationships between company strategies and structures is noted, as is the relative dearth of empirical work in this area. The article reports a preliminary study of 24 companies investigating the relationships between strategies of diversification and geographic dispersion of territories covered and structural variables relating to the number of structural differentiations in a company, the decentalization of decision-making and functional specialization. Contrary to the hypotheses proposed, these two strategic variables have different structural implications with geographic dispersion particularly associated with structural differentiation and diversification associated with decentralization.