Effects of complexity on the success of temporary organizations: Relationship quality and transparency as substitutes for formal coordination mechanisms

• Analysis of the effects of three types of complexity on temporary organizations.
• Empirical study of knowledge-intensive consulting projects.
• Structural complexity has a negative effect on temporary organizations.
• Task complexity and temporal complexity have no effect.
• Relationship quality and transparency between client and agent act as mediators.

The organizational literature has considered complexity as an important factor influencing organizations. More recently, the degree of dissemination of temporary organizations (TOs) increased and today TOs can be found in almost every industry. This corresponds to an augmenting treatment in the literature where TOs are often described as appropriate means to cope with complexity. Yet, few empirical studies to date have analyzed the effects of complexity on the success of TOs. This paper considers three prevalent types of complexity (structural, task, temporal) and integrates two factors (relationship quality, transparency) which are hypothesized to mediate the influence of complexity on the efficiency and effectiveness of TOs. We test the hypothesis using a sample of knowledge-intensive consulting projects. The results show that TOs possess a high degree of “complexity resistance” and are therefore particularly suited for solving unique and complex problems. Of the three types of complexity considered, only structural complexity significantly influences efficiency and effectiveness of TOs. Relationship quality and transparency act as mediators on this effect and can be used to mitigate negative effects of complexity.