14991: Do We Need Novel Organization Design to Address Societal Grand Challenges?

Tuesday, July 29, 2025

13:45 - 15:15 CEST (GMT+2)

Location: Bella Center: Hall D- D4-m1

Session Type: Symposium (panel)
Orientation: Practice,Research
Shareable link: https://cdmcd.co/4RpX5K

Moderator(s)

AS

Anna Szerb

New York University Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates

Participant(s)

JB

John-Erik Hugo Bergkvist

Stockholm School of Economics, Sweden
OB

Oliver Baumann

U. of Southern Denmark, Denmark
PP

Phanish Puranam

INSEAD, Singapore
AG

Aline Gatignon

The Wharton School, U. of Pennsylvania, United States
RG

Ranjay Gulati

Harvard Business School, United States

Academics and practitioners are increasingly concerned about the limited progress in addressing critical societal issues, also termed as “grand challenges.” While organization design has only recently begun attracting academic attention for its potential role in addressing these challenges, the task of aligning diverse actors towards a common goal is fundamentally an organization design problem. While novel organization design forms may offer solutions to seemingly intractable organizational problems, some argue that effective implementation of fundamental organization design elements remains critical, especially when organizations pursue both social and financial goals. Therefore, this panel symposium aims to bring together panelists with diverse perspectives for an interactive discussion on a pivotal question: Is novel organizational design truly necessary to tackle societal grand challenges, or can a deeper understanding and effective application of fundamental design principles enable organizations to balance dual objectives effectively?