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Publications
  • 2018
  • Working Paper
  • HBS Working Paper Series

Design Rules, Volume 2: How Technology Shapes Organizations: Chapter 6 The Value Structure of Technologies, Part 1: Mapping Functional Relationships

By: Carliss Y. Baldwin
  • Format:Print
  • | Language:English
  • | Pages:25
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Abstract

Organizations are formed in a free economy because a person or group perceives value in carrying out a technical recipe that is beyond the capacity of a single person. Technology specifies what must be done, what resources must be assembled, what actions taken, and what transfers made in order to convert stocks of material, energy, and information into products of value to someone.
The purpose of this chapter is to build a robust and versatile language that is capable of representing large technical systems. The language is based on elements I have labeled functional components. The language is more abstract than the language of technical recipes and task structures, thus it is capable of hiding details that may be distracting. However, the language also makes it possible to “track back” from each named functional component to a technical recipe (or the lack of one).

Keywords

Language; Information Technology; System; Relationships

Citation

Baldwin, Carliss Y. "Design Rules, Volume 2: How Technology Shapes Organizations: Chapter 6 The Value Structure of Technologies, Part 1: Mapping Functional Relationships." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 19-037, October 2018.
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About The Author

Carliss Y. Baldwin

→More Publications

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    • 2021
    • Faculty Research

    Computer-Implemented Methods and Systems for Measuring, Estimating, and Managing Economic Outcomes and Technical Debt in Software Systems and Projects: US Patent 11,126,427 B2

    By: Daniel J. Sturtevant, Carliss Baldwin, Alan MacCormack, Sunny Ahn and Sean Gilliland
    • 2020
    • Faculty Research

    Design Rules, Volume 2: How Technology Shapes Organizations: Chapter 7 The Value Structure of Technologies, Part 2: Strategy without Numbers

    By: Carliss Y. Baldwin
    • 2020
    • Faculty Research

    Design Rules, Volume 2: How Technology Shapes Organizations: Chapter 6 The Value Structure of Technologies, Part 1: Mapping Functional Relationships

    By: Carliss Y. Baldwin
More from the Author
  • Computer-Implemented Methods and Systems for Measuring, Estimating, and Managing Economic Outcomes and Technical Debt in Software Systems and Projects: US Patent 11,126,427 B2 By: Daniel J. Sturtevant, Carliss Baldwin, Alan MacCormack, Sunny Ahn and Sean Gilliland
  • Design Rules, Volume 2: How Technology Shapes Organizations: Chapter 7 The Value Structure of Technologies, Part 2: Strategy without Numbers By: Carliss Y. Baldwin
  • Design Rules, Volume 2: How Technology Shapes Organizations: Chapter 6 The Value Structure of Technologies, Part 1: Mapping Functional Relationships By: Carliss Y. Baldwin
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