A study of decision making processes and communication rules, in a corporate setting undergoing change as a result of organizational ineffectiveness, examined whether (1) decisions about formal communication reporting systems were linked to management assumptions about technical creativity/effectiveness, (2) assumptions about creativity/effectiveness governed decisions and communication rules, and (3) organizational communication satisfaction differed with differing evaluations of organizational creativity/effectiveness. Subjects were 112 employees of a computer technology research and development laboratory that had recently replaced its manager and his three top assistants with managers from other labs in the same corporation because of the lab's ineffectiveness. Data were gathered through interviews, policy reviews, observation, survey instruments, and corporate evaluations of the lab. Results supported a relationship between management assumptions about technical creativity/effectiveness and formal reporting procedures. In particular, top management assumed that the replaced informal reporting systems provided inadequate information to make timely decisions involving considerable technical complexity, that the formal reporting environment demanded a precision of presentation that stimulated creativity and peer interaction, and that in order to stimulate effectiveness in an ineffective setting, substantial change in communication procedures would be required to make other changes credible. (FL)