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Pragmatism is very relevant to workplace management and performance measurement, yet in the accounting literature, it is a term used loosely and in a colloquial manner. By drawing on a framework based on classical pragmatism, this study aims to examine how a pragmatic perspective is discernible in the form and use of management control (MC) practices.

This study collects data using a case study of a firm in the green energy construction sector.

Building on the analytical framework, this study provides evidence that a pragmatic perspective is discernible in both form and use of MC practices, through a clear focus on targets rather than variance analysis, the presence of mutable local MC practices characterised by interaction and problem-solving and the absence of other common MC practices with no clear links to ends-in-view. This study also provides evidence of the potential limitations of a pragmatic perspective including myopia and an exacerbation of the inherent bias in organisations towards exploitation.

This research brings analytical clarity to the study of pragmatism in the accounting literature and insights into how a pragmatic perspective is discernible in the form and use of MC practices. Further, the study shows the potential limitations of a pragmatic perspective for management.

Prior literature provides little insight on how management control systems have responded to the growth of collaborative new product development (NPD). The purpose of this paper is to contrast the use of budgets to manage collaborative and in-house NPD and to consider the implications for enabling flexibility.

The paper reports on the findings of a case study company in the medical devices industry that uses two different business models for its NPD activities. While the company engages in in-house NPD for its own products, it also engages in collaborative NPD services with a range of customers.

The study illuminates how two types of budgets (annual and project) can have very different impacts on flexibility under different business models. The annual financial budgets imposed rigid constraints on in-house NPD and resulted in reduced flexibility, whereas in collaborative NPD, they had little impact on flexibility. Project budgets created hard operational constraints in collaborative NPD which generated a highly pressurised yet highly creative environment, whereas project budgets had little impact on flexibility in in-house NPD.

The study contributes detailed empirical insights into the control systems used to manage collaborative NPD from the supplier perspective, where creativity is largely responsive and contrasts these with the management of in-house NPD where creativity is largely expected. The authors also contribute an analysis of the key control systems and other factors that sustain flexibility in this highly pressurised open innovation environment.

This study examines how an externally imposed management control system (MCS) – hospital accreditation – influences the salience of organisational tensions and consequently attitudes of management towards the system.

Data are collected using a case study of a large public hospital in Spain. In-depth interviews were conducted with 27 senior and middle managers across different functions. Relying on the organisational dualities classification in the literature, tensions are unpacked and analysed.

Evidence is presented of how hospital accreditation increases the salience of organisational tensions arising from exposition of the organisational dualities of learning, performing, organising and belonging. Salient tensions were evident in the ambivalent attitudes of management towards the hospital accreditation system.

The role of mandatory external control systems in exposing ambivalence and tensions will be of interest to organisational managers.

The study extends the management control literature by identifying an active role for an external MCS (accreditation) in increasing the salience of organisational tensions and triggering ambivalence. Contrary to the prior literature, the embedding of both poles of an organisational duality into the MCS is not a necessary precondition for increased tension salience. The range of attitudes towards MCSs beyond those specified in the previous literature (positive/negative/neutral) is extended to include ambivalence.

Tremendous change has taken place in organisational structures, networks and strategy over the past 25 years. Yet, a strategic management framework developed 25 years ago has increased in popularity among researchers in the past decade. This paper aims to review how Simons’ Levers of Control (LOC) framework has been used in empirical research studies over the past 25 years.

The findings are based on electronic database searches of papers adopting Simons’ framework published in accounting and management journals.

A total of 45 empirical studies adopting the LOC framework are presented chronologically by research method. The review highlights the far greater use of the framework in qualitative compared to quantitative studies. Qualitative studies have extended the application of the framework to broader organisational issues such as sustainability, environmental accounting and inter-organisational controls. The quantitative studies have mainly sought to add to our understanding of the antecedents and outcomes of the use of interactive control systems.

This paper furthers our understanding of Simons’ framework by synthesising and analysing the literature over 25 years. It provides insight into the varying interpretations of the concepts underlying the framework in empirical studies including differences in operationalisation of the concepts in quantitative studies. In addition, it highlights the application of the framework beyond the original domain in which it was developed. Fruitful areas for future research are pointed to in the paper.

The aim of the research is to investigate, using a field survey, the concept of underreporting of time (URT), from both an individual and organisational perspective as a defence mechanism for coping with time budget pressure.

Big Four audit partners and seniors are interviewed regarding the factors that motivate staff auditors to engage in manipulation of time records and the consequences of the behaviour for individual auditors and audit firms.

Findings indicate that time record manipulation is not a single type of activity as suggested previously, but includes a variety of behaviours, six of which are identified in the study. Each of these constitutes a very different type of defence mechanism, motivated by different influences and resulting in different outcomes for the individual and the organisation. The firms engage in a defence mechanism characterised by a series of mixed messages to avoid dealing with inherent cost/quality conflicts and elements of this mechanism become embedded in routine activities at different levels in the firms.

The implications for audit firms vary with the type of time record manipulation and future research therefore needs to concentrate on a closer examination of the various practices that make up URT as identified in this study.

The insights provided by the research are used to explain apparently conflicting arguments in the literature and to set out implications for research and practice.

Audit firms face a constant conflict between the business of auditing and the profession of auditing, which is manifested at audit senior level in the pressure to perform quality work within specified time limits. Prior quantitative studies have reported high levels of quality‐threatening behaviour (QTB) at senior level and the importance of examining contributory factors has been highlighted. Semi‐structured interviews were conducted with audit seniors in four of the (then) Big Five firms and findings suggest that key variables (time pressure, participative target setting, and style of performance evaluation) have been inadequately operationalised in previous studies and that two distinct forms of QTB exist: deliberate and inadvertent. Propositions are developed for variables associated with both forms of QTB, which provide direction and focus for future research.

Recent accounting research has connected the coercive and enabling types of formalisation (C/E) (Adler and Borys, 1996) with the distinction between diagnostic and interactive controls (D/I) proposed by Simons (1995, 2000) to tackle research questions on complex control situations involving both the degree of employee autonomy and patterns of management attention. The diverse conceptual approaches used for connecting C/E and D/I have led to fragmentation in the literature and raise concerns about their conceptual clarity. In this paper, we assess the conceptual clarity of various forms of connection between C/E and D/I. Firstly, we conduct an in-depth content analysis of 59 recent papers, and inductively identify three points of conceptual ambiguity and divergence in the literature (namely, the perspective from which a phenomenon is studied; whether categories capture choices driven by design or by style-of-use; and the properties of control systems). We also observe that the literature proposes various forms of connection (i.e. coexistence, inclusion, and combination approaches). Secondly, we use the three detected points of ambiguity and divergence as assessment criteria, and evaluate the extent to which conceptual clarity is at risk under each form of connection. Based on this assessment, we provide guidelines to enhance the conceptual clarity of the connections between C/E and D/I, propose several research models, and indicate opportunities for future research in this area.