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Accounting for quality and improved organizational performance has recently received attention in management control research. However, the extent to which process innovation changes have been integrated into management control research is limited. This paper contributes to that integration by drawing from institutional adaptive theory of organizational change and process innovation strategies. The paper utilizes a 2 by 2 contingency table that uses two factors: environmental conditions and organizational change/learning strategies, to build a process innovation framework. A combination of these two factors yields four process innovation strategies: mechanistic, organic, organizational development (OD) and organizational transformation (OT).

The four process innovation typologies are applied to characterize innovations in accounting such as activity based costing (ABC). ABC has been discussed as a multi-phased innovation process that provides an environment where both the initiation and the implementation of accounting change can occur. Technical innovation can be successfully initiated as organic innovation that unfolds in a decentralized organization and requires radical change and double loop learning. Implementation occurs best as a mechanistic innovation in a hierarchical organization and involving incremental change and single loop learning. The paper concludes that if ABC is integrated into an OD or OT intervention strategy, the technical and administrative innovation aspects of ABC can be utilized to manage the organization’s operating activities.

Sisaye and Birnberg (2010a, 2010b) have described the extent and scope of the innovations dimensions as the degree to which learning has affected the organizational structures and processes of the organization. Within this framework, extent has been defined as the degree to which the innovation affects the organization's management accounting administrative structures, systems, and behaviors of members or units within the organization. Extent is synonymous with the two types of learning identified by Argyris and Schon (1978) discussed earlier. Thus, the learning in the extent dimension varies from a technical change within an existing system (single loop) to the adoption of an entirely new administrative system (double loop). While this continuum extends from technical changes that affect a single process or task to administrative changes that affect organization-wide systems and structures, we will treat them as though they are dichotomous. As indicated earlier (Chapter 2), extent is associated with two types of learning: single loop (technical change within an existing system, i.e., gradual-incremental) and double loop (the adoption of an entirely new system, i.e., radical-transformational) (Argyris & Schon, 1978, 1996).

The mechanistic-organic assumptions of SF address those organizational factors related to structural arrangements, contextual factors, job-task work activities, and human resources management policies. Organizations adopt structures and procedures in search of legitimacy and institutionalization (Riebero & Scapens, 2006, p. 96). Structures manifest themselves in centralized (mechanistic) and/or decentralized (organic) forms. These structures can be loose or tightly controlled; they can involve independent or interdependent tasks. These conditions have a direct impact on the operation of management information and control systems that will, in turn, impact organizational learning and process innovations, which, ultimately, affects organizational performance.

OD refers to cell 3 of the adoption-diffusion innovation typology defined in Table 1. It has an administrative extent and an autonomous scope. OD has been used pre-dominantly in organizational change and sociology literature to describe cultural innovation programs that are directed toward a change in individual employee behavior. In accounting, the OD approach is important because accounting innovations, such as ABC, are directed toward a change in managers' behavior and the use of accounting data to evaluate performance. The OD approach is applicable in the use of ABC data at the divisional or unit level. Before explaining the application and use of OD in accounting innovations, we will define OD and summarize its innovation approaches as described in organizational sociology and behavior literature.

The paper extends the organizational learning framework: Structural-Functional (SF)-single-loop or Conflictual-Radical (CR)-double-loop learning to the management accounting literature. The sociological approach of organizational learning is utilized to understand those contingent factors that can explain why management accounting innovations succeed or fail in organizations.

We view learning as enhancing an organization’s strategic competitive advantage by making it better able to adopt and diffuse innovation in respond to changes in its environment in order to manage improved performance. The success of management accounting innovations is contingent upon whether its learning process involves SF-single-loop or CR-double-loop learning to adopt and diffuse process innovation.

The paper suggests that the learning strategy that the organization chooses is the reason why some management accounting innovations are more successfully adopted than others and why some innovations are easily diffused in some organizations but not in others. We propose that the sociological approaches to learning provide an alternative framework with which to better understand the adoption and diffusion of process innovations in management accounting systems.

It has become evident that management accounting researchers need to pay particular attention to an organization’s approach to adoption and diffusion of innovation strategies, particularly when they are designing and implementing process innovation programs for an organization. According to Schulz (2001), there are two interrelated stages of the learning that can shape the outcome of the innovation process in an organization. The first stage is related to the acquisition/production (adoption) of knowledge that results in gathering information, codification, and exploration. This is followed by the second stage which is the distribution or dissemination (diffusion) processes. When these two stages – adoption and diffusion – are applied within an accounting context, they address issues that are commonly associated with the successes and/or failures of management accounting innovations.

Although innovation involves learning, the nature of the learning process does not completely describe the manner in which an innovation affects the organization. Accordingly, we suggest that the two interrelated organizational sociological dimensions of innovations processes, namely, (1) the adoption and diffusion theories of Rogers (1971 and 1995), to approach organizational learning, and (2) the SF (single loop) and CR (double loop) approaches to learning be used simultaneously to describe management accounting innovations.

When an innovation is implemented, it initially can be introduced as an incremental change, one that can be limited in both in its scope and its breadth of administrative changes. This means that situations which are most likely to benefit from its initiation can serve as the prototype for its adoption by the organization. If successful, this can be followed by systemic accounting innovations to instituting broader administrative changes within the existing accounting reporting and control systems.

A glossary of definitions is provided below to familiarize the reader with some of the sociology and organizational behavior literature terminology used throughout this book. We also relate this terminology to management accounting concepts to combine these two streams of literature into an integrated process innovation framework in management accounting systems.

In this chapter, we explore the relationship between organizational complexity and firm-level innovation. We define and operationalize a new construct, experienced complexity, which is the extent to which the organizational environment makes it challenging for decision makers to do their jobs effectively. We distinguish experienced complexity from structural complexity, which is the elements of the organization, such as the number of reporting lines or integrating mechanisms, that are deliberately put in place to help the organization deliver on its objectives, and we argue that structural complexity correlates positively with firm-level innovation, while experienced complexity correlates negatively with innovation. Using a novel dataset combining survey and objective data on 209 large firms, we find support for our arguments.

Researchers in the social sciences have studied the process by which new ideas are adopted (implemented) and how acceptance is generated among those charged with accepting and implementing an innovation. Sociology, in particular, has developed an extensive literature on diffusion analysis which examines how innovations are diffused (see Coleman, Katz, & Menzel, 1966; Leagans & Loomis, 1971; Rogers, 1971; Rogers & Shoemaker, 1971). While many of these studies dealt with the adoption and diffusion of a new product, for example, seed corn or drugs, the same analysis has been applied to process innovations, that is, system and organizational change.

The aim of this chapter is to shed light on the perspectives of organizational innovation in higher education in light of socio-economic transformations as articulated in Vision 2030 for Saudi Arabia. A case study evaluating strategic innovation at the Arabian Gulf University (AGU) in Bahrain was conducted using Balanced Score Cards. A questionnaire was designed to capture enablers and barriers in organizational innovation in higher education. The chapter concluded that institutional inertia, limited implementation and evaluation processes are the key impediments for organizational learning and knowledge management. The study recommends to incorporate organizational innovation to foster entrepreneurship, strategic innovation and learning at higher education institutions (HEI).

Creativity and innovation have been buzzwords of managerial discourse over the last few decades as they contribute to the long-term survival and competitiveness of firms. Given the non-linear, causally ambiguous, and intangible nature of all innovation-related phenomena, management scholars have been trying to uncover factors that contribute to creativity and innovation from multiple lenses ranging from organizational behavior at the micro-level to strategic management at the macro-level. Along with important and insightful developments in these research streams that evolved independently from one another, human resource management (HRM) research – especially from a strategic perspective – has only recently started to contribute to a better understanding of both creativity and innovation. The goal of this chapter is to review the contributions of strategic HRM research to an improved understanding of creativity at the individual-level and innovation at the firm-level. In organizing this review, the authors rely on the open innovation funnel as a metaphor to review research on both HRM practices and HRM systems that contribute to creativity and innovation. In the last section, the authors focus on more recent developments in HRM research that focus on ambidexterity – as a way for HRM to simultaneously facilitate exploration and exploitation. This chapter concludes with a discussion of future research directions.