Strategy-Structure Fit in the Shadow of Exploration-Exploitation
Bibliographic record
Abstract
This study provides the first large-sample test of Chandler’s famous strategy-structure hypothesis in the context of the exploration-exploitation trade-off. To this end, we construct measures of the degree to which strategies and organizational structure are oriented towards exploration as opposed to exploitation for a representative panel dataset of all Canadian business firms. We obtain three main results. First, high intensity of exploration strategies is negatively related to high intensity of exploitation strategies, as implied by a strategic exploration-exploitation trade-off. Second, higher relative importance of exploration (exploitation) in strategy is systematically correlated with more adoption of organizational practices that support exploration (exploitation). We show that this pattern holds dynamically as well, as strategic repositioning towards exploration is systematically correlated with restructuring towards exploration-supporting practices. Additionally, this strategy-structure relationship continues to hold if we instrument strategic positioning using firm peers. Third, intensifying low-cost competition, which reduces the benefits of exploitation strategies leads to a systematic shift towards more exploration strategies, while increasing misalignment between strategy and structure.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.003 | 0.016 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.002 | 0.002 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.003 | 0.002 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Research integrity | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.007 | 0.001 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".