An Agent-Based Simulation Framework for the Analysis
of the Equilibria Emergence in a Complex Structure such as a Firm
Ugo Merlone, Arianna Dal Forno
merlone@econ.unito.it
This paper presents an agent-based simulation framework
for the analysis of the equilibria emergence in a complex structure such
as a firm; we can think of these equilibria as corporate culture. Corporate
culture may be defined as the basic assumptions and beliefs that are shared
by the members of a group or organization and that are used as a norm. The
problem in organizations is to identify a rule that allows for relatively
efficient transactions to take place, and devise some way to communicate
that rule to all current and potential employees. We concentrate on modeling
the effort exerted by heterogeneous agents in a firm, and how the interaction
between them may lead to a common level of effort (corporate culture). The
simple model we propose is a system in which agents interact in a dynamic,
adaptive and evolving way. Such a model encompasses many of the peculiarities
which make organization modeling a hard task, because it would involve a
difficult mathematical problem with solution highly sensitive to parameters.
The computational approach, by contrast, allows to overcome these difficulties
and easily consider both perfectly rational and bounded-rational agents;
this way we are able to study the interactions between different types of
agents and interpret them in the relevant economic frame. Consequently we
can observe how different compositions of the population may lead the system
to different common behaviors; the implications of our findings are both
descriptive and normative, and shed light on some core problems of the economics
of organization design.