Tim Carroll

541.737.6024

tim.carroll@oregonstate.edu

People and Faculty

Tim Carroll

Overview

Publications

Overview

Biography

Tim Carroll, who prioritized superior, student-centered learning as dean of the Eberhardt School of Business at the University of the Pacific, became the Sara Hart Kimball Dean of Oregon State University’s College of Business effective July 30, 2021.

Carroll has served as a dean and a professor of management at the University of the Pacific in Stockton, California, since 2018. At Pacific, he led the development of a new college strategic plan, increased student retention and enrollment, launched programs to meet the needs of students and employers, created events to enhance communication between the college and students, and expanded fundraising.

Prior to joining the University of the Pacific, Carroll served as associate dean of executive development at the University of South Carolina’s Darla Moore School of Business.

At South Carolina, Carroll served as president of Corporate Solutions LLC, a private arm of the business school that fosters corporate partnerships to address employer talent needs and promotes student experiential learning projects. Additionally, he led the school’s nationally ranked professional MBA program, leveraging technology and a blended learning approach to deliver classes across seven sites in two states.

Before working at South Carolina, Carroll was a member of the faculty at Georgia Tech, where he developed innovative academic courses and cultivated external partnerships.

Carroll’s scholarly expertise focuses on competitive strategy and organization. He has consulted and delivered executive development programs to companies in the aerospace, apparel, banking, computer, construction, energy, engineering services, media, mining, petroleum, pharmaceutical, railroad, restaurant and telecommunication industries, as well as several government agencies. He holds a Ph.D. in management from Duke University.

He has also served on many community, non-profit and business development advisory or board roles.

Publications

Book

Management

“Organization Design, Organizational Learning, and the Market Value of the Firm”

We compare market returns associated with firms’ creation of new units focused on e-business. Two aspects of organization design - governance and leadership - are considered with regard to exploitation- and exploration-oriented organization learning. We find that exploitation in governance (high centralization) is associated with a lower mean and variance in returns; that exploitation in leadership (appointment of outsiders) is associated with the same mean yet higher variance; and, among units exhibiting both modes of learning, the variance of returns are not equal.

Details

Academic Journal

Management

“Designing a New Organization at NASA: An Organization Design Process Using Simulation”

The challenge for NASA’s Systems Analysis Integrated Discipline Team (SAIDT) is to develop a new organization design capable of performing complex modeling and analysis tasks, using team members at various NASA centers. The focus is on: (1) design as a process, (2) the effect of design tools on the process as well as alternative designs, (3) the fit between the tools and their fit with the organization, (4) the effect of an ongoing agency-wide transformation, and (5) implications for organizational contingency theory.

Details

Academic Journal

Management

“Organizations and complexity: Searching for the edge of chaos”

Traditional organizational theory advocates increased differentiation and horizontal integration for organizations in unstable environments or with uncertain technologies. This paper seeks to develop a better understanding of the relationship of group structure and the level of interdependency between individuals on group performance under various task complexities. Complexity theory in general, and NK models in particular, are introduced as theoretical frameworks that offer an explanation for group performance. Simulation models are developed, based on the communication network research of Bavelas (1948) and Leavitt (1952), to explore the effects of decentralization and interdependence. The simulation model developed here shows general consistency with previous human subject experiments. However, contrary to predictions, not all decentralized group structures perform well when undertaking complex task assignments. Structures that are highly connected (actors communicating with all others) perform much worse than those with a lower level of connection. Further experiments varying both the number of actors and the degree of interdependence between them find evidence of the “edge of chaos.” This research advances our understanding of organizations beyond earlier models by suggesting that there is an optimal range of interconnectedness between actors or tasks that explains the variation in performance. An intriguing result is that this optimal level of interdependence is fairly low, regardless of the size of the group.

Details

Academic Journal

Management

“The coevolution of new organizational forms”

This paper outlines an alternative theory of organization-environment coevolution that generalizes a model of organization adaptation first proposed by March (1991), linking firm-level exploration and exploitation adaptations to changes in the population of organizations. The theory considers organizations, their populations, and their environments as the interdependent outcome of managerial actions, institutional influences, and extra-institutional changes (technological, sociopolitical, and other environmental phenomena). In particular, the theory incorporates potential differences and equifinal outcomes related to country-specific variation. The basic theses of this paper are that firm strategic and organization adaptations coevolve with changes in the environment (competitive dynamics, technological, and institutional) and organization population and forms, and that new organizational forms can mutate and emerge from the existing population of organizations. The theory has guided a multicountry research collaboration on strategic and organization adaptations and the mutation and emergence of new organizational forms from within the existing population of organizations.

Details