TASK COMPLEXITY, ORGANIZATION SIZE, AND ADMINISTRATIVE INTENSITY: THE CASE OF UK UNIVERSITIES
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/padm.12078 |
| Published date | 01 September 2014 |
| Author | GEORGE A. BOYNE,RHYS ANDREWS |
| Date | 01 September 2014 |
doi: 10.1111/padm.12078
TASK COMPLEXITY, ORGANIZATION SIZE, AND
ADMINISTRATIVE INTENSITY: THE CASE OF UK
UNIVERSITIES
RHYS ANDREWS AND GEORGE A. BOYNE
The task complexity and size of public service organizations are arguably key determinants of the
proportion of resources devoted to administration. Moreover, the combined effect of these two
variables is also likely to have important implications for the scale of the administrative function.
To explore the separate and combined effects of task complexity and size on administrative
intensity in public service organizations, we examine the determinants of the relative proportion of
resources allocated to central administration rather than academic departments in UK universities
between 2003 and 2008. The results suggest that there is a non-linear U-shaped impact of both task
complexity and size on administrative intensity, and that in combination these characteristics lead
to a bigger central administrative component in universities. Theoretical and practical implications
are discussed.
INTRODUCTION
Public service organizations are complex professional bureaucracies, large and frequently
difficult to manage. Their effective management is dependent upon the creation of a
cadre of central administrative staff and support units responsible for the coordination
of organizational activities. The central administrative function of any organization
typically comprises those personnel with no direct role in delivery of a service or
production of a good, such as the senior management, central administrative divisions
(e.g. finance, human resources), and clerical workers providing services to the whole of
an organization. The central administration function is therefore distinguished from the
production functions responsible for the delivery of services (e.g. professionals and street-
level bureaucrats in public organizations, and their immediate administrative support
personnel). The ratio of corporate administrative resources to the resources expended in
service departments constitutes the central administrative intensity of an organization.
Since the administrative function is an ‘overhead’ that is added to service delivery costs,
it is important to investigate its potential determinants. But what determines whether the
administrative centre of a public organization is large or small?
After a number of studies of the determinants of administrative intensity between
the 1960s and 1980s, this topic has been largely neglected in recent years (Boyne and
Meier 2013). Much of the previous work drew on various forms of contingency theory
which posit that organizational characteristics are influenced by, or contingent upon,
their external and internal contexts. In a comprehensive review of the development
of contingency theory, Donaldson (2001, p. 16) argues that the various strands of the
contingency view of organizational structure ‘may be integrated by stating that there
are two main contingencies, task and size’. Furthermore, contingency theory implies
that there is no ‘right’ level of administrative intensity, other than the level that ‘fits’
circumstances such as the complexity of the task an organization faces and the scale of the
Rhys Andrews is Professor of Public Management at Cardiff Business School, Cardiff University and George Boyne is
Professor of Public Sector Management and Pro Vice-Chancellor of the College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences,
Cardiff University, UK.
Public Administration Vol. 92, No. 3, 2014 (656–672)
©2014 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
ADMINISTRATIVE INTENSITY OF UK UNIVERSITIES 657
operations that are being undertaken (Van de Ven et al. 2013). In this article we revisit the
topic of administrative intensity in the public sector, and empirically evaluate whether
task complexity and size are important influences on the proportion of resources devoted
to administrative overheads rather than front-line service provision.
We not only revisit the contingency perspective on administrative intensity, but also
extend previous work in several ways. First, the focus of prior research has usually been
on organizational size, and in most studies only the linear effect of size is considered
(Boyne and Meier 2013). In this article we examine not only the effects of size but also
whether task complexity makes a difference to administrative intensity in the public
sector. Second, we hypothesize that both task complexity and size have non-linear effects,
and that increases in either of these organizational characteristics at first lead to lower
intensity but eventually lead to higher intensity. Finally, we hypothesize that complexity
and size have jointly reinforcing effects on intensity. Thus, for example, an increase in
size is likely to have an especially strong positive effect in organizations that have high
complexity.
In past studies the issue of task complexity has largely been examined by focusing on
the implications of alternative approaches to structuring the division of labour within
organizations (see, e.g. Hall et al. 1967). In particular, the number of different production
units has long been regarded as an indicator of task complexity (Dewar and Hage 1978)
and a potentially important influence on other organizational characteristics, including
the relative intensity of central administrative activity (Kahn et al. 1964). According to the
‘complexity–administrative growth hypothesis’ (Rushing 1967), high levels of task com-
plexity lead to an expansion of the administrative function within organizations, as the
need to monitor and manage disparate production units poses new and complicated coor-
dination problems (Blau and Schoenherr 1971). Moreover, the complexity–administrative
growth hypothesis suggests that the size of an organization is associated with a growth
in administration due to the sheer number of employees to be managed.
The ‘complexity–administrative growth’ hypothesis stands in stark contrast to argu-
ments on economies of scale and scope which suggest that complex large organizations
benefit from the ability to spread administrative expertise across more functions and
staff (Koshal and Koshal 1999). Since most public sector organizations are big, division-
alized professional bureaucracies that employ large numbers of central administrative
staff (Mintzberg 1979), these contrasting arguments about administrative intensity remain
of considerable theoretical and practical importance. We evaluate the validity of these
different perspectives on the administrative arm within public organizations by inves-
tigating the separate and combined effects of task complexity and size on the central
administrative intensity of universities in the UK between 2003 and 2008.
Do structurally complex organizations devote more or less resources to central adminis-
tration? Is central administrative intensity higher or lower in big organizations? What are
the combined effects of task complexity and organization size on central administrative
intensity? To answer these questions, we carry out statistical analyses of the relationship
between the number of production units within UK universities, the size of those institu-
tions, and central administrative intensity. First, we review prior research, which suggests
that the relationships between task complexity and central administrative intensity, and
organizational size and central administrative intensity, may take a variety of forms. In
doing so, we develop arguments about the relationships that we expect to observe in
our analysis, by synthesizing competing views on whether complexity and size have
positive or negative effects on intensity. Thereafter, we outline our statistical model and
Public Administration Vol. 92, No. 3, 2014 (656–672)
©2014 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
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