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Family firms possess dual identities, being the family and the business, which can be segmented and integrated to various degrees. This study examines whether and how management control technologies are calibrated to fit into the dual identities of family firms.

A qualitative study of 20 family firms was conducted using semi-structured, in-depth interviews with owner-managers, drawings of mental maps and publicly available information. The notion of calibration was developed and used, with its three components of graduation, purpose and reference, as an organizing device for the interpretive understanding of the management control usage and its relation to family firms’ dual identities.

The study finds that the use of calculative, family-centric and procedural management controls – in sum the pervasive use of management control technologies – are associated with a professionalization of the family firm, a foregrounding of the business identity and a reduction of the disadvantageous side of familiness. In comparison, the pragmatic and minimal use of management control technologies are found to be associated with an emphasis on family identity. It transpires as liberating, engendering trust and unfolding a familial environment.

Because results are derived from a qualitative approach, they are not generalizable at an empirical level. By showing how the use of management control technologies is calibrated with reference to family firms’ dual identities, the paper reveals the perceived potency of control technologies to affect the identity of firms.

The study reveals how family firms perceive management control technologies as strengthening their business identity while weakening their family identity. Thereby, this study provides an account of how management control technologies are expected to change the identity of firms.

This paper contributes to the management control and family business literatures because it uncovers how management control technologies are calibrated in reference to family firms’ dual identities. It shows that calculative, family-centric and procedural management controls are used to professionalize the firm and strengthen its business identity as well as to reduce the negative effects of the family identity. The paper also illustrates how the liberating force of using pragmatic and minimal control technologies can serve to give prominence to the family identity.

This study proposes targeted modernization of the Department of Defense (DoD's) Joint Forces Ammunition Logistics information system by implementing the optimized innovative information technology open architecture design and integrating Radio Frequency Identification Device data technologies and real-time optimization and control mechanisms as the critical technology components of the solution. The innovative information technology, which pursues the focused logistics, will be deployed in 36 months at the estimated cost of $568 million in constant dollars. We estimate that the Systems, Applications, Products (SAP)-based enterprise integration solution that the Army currently pursues will cost another $1.5 billion through the year 2014; however, it is unlikely to deliver the intended technical capabilities.

Government reforms have seen shifts from rules-based to principles-based risk regulatory governance. This paper examines the effects of principles-based risk regulatory reforms on public sector risk management (RM) and management control practices in public sector organizations (PSOs).

The principles-based regulation focuses on providing autonomy to PSOs while maintaining control over their actions without direct intervention. This resonates with Foucault's notion of how modern forms of governments operate. The research is informed by Foucault's concept of governmentality. The authors conducted a qualitative field study of an Australian PSO, gathering and analysing data from interviews, focus groups, and archival documents.

The findings show the capillary modes by which principles-based risk regulatory regime penetrates and works with management control practices in pursuit of regulatory goals within the PSO the authors studied. In addition, the authors find that the principles-based approach (focusing on autonomy) and rules-based approach (focusing on control) are not opposites in kind and effect but rather, autonomy should be understood as a central pillar of control. Furthermore, the findings show how cultural controls and formal controls are not in conflict but are interconnected in RM practices, with cultural controls providing control architecture for RM and formal control translating the control architecture into routines. Finally, the study provides insights into how enterprise risk management (ERM) provides capabilities for and routinizes RM practices in a PSO and the management control systems (MCS) that enabled this to occur.

The paper provides novel insights into how MCS are infiltrated, mobilized and deployed to enact principles-based risk regulatory reforms. These insights are useful for regulators, practitioners and researchers.

This research examines Indian service managers' perceptions on impact of convergent technologies on their work and resultant organisational performance. The research uses four dimensions – task productivity, task innovation, customer satisfaction and management control – taken together, to investigate the perceived impact of convergent technologies adoption in service organisations context and further examines the resultant organisational performance, based on these dimensions.

The study used partial least squares (PLS) approach to evaluate the measurement model and the structural model. The study was conducted in service industry firms that have made a significant progression towards adopting convergent technologies.

The results of the study demonstrated higher levels of perceived impact of adoption of convergent technologies on all the four dimensions (i.e. task productivity, task innovation, customer satisfaction and management control). The results of the study also indicate that all the impact dimensions positively influence organisational performance.

The results of the study suggest that all the impact dimensions positively influence organisation, therefore the service sector managers should be aware about the role of adopting latest convergent technologies so as to enhance the task productivity, innovation, customer satisfaction and management control in their job roles.

The practical implications of this research are derived on the basis of Future of Work, Labour Market Information Systems, Productivity, Enterprise Development, Enhancing skills of service employees and Employability themes.

To researchers best knowledge is to first study of its kind to evaluate the perceived impact of convergent technologies on organisational performance in Indian context.

This paper aims to present an empirical case where fundamental changes in the environment have forced an organization to re‐evaluate its management control systems and possibly search for destabilizing supporting routines in order to unlearn the established ways of measuring and controlling within the organization. The problem, however, is that organizational technologies often work in the other direction, i.e. they promote stability in organizational routines. The paper seeks to increase understanding regarding the importance of destabilizing, or, as the authors like to call them, sensebreaking activities within organizations that are present in rapidly changing environments.

The authors used multiple sources and multiple techniques to collect data; interviews with managers, participation in meetings, and document analysis such as annual reports, pamphlets, speeches and Swedish Armed Forces's (SAF's) web site.

The study is clearly presented in a design‐oriented way. The benefits, however, are that it illustrates that the available models take for granted that the organization has a mission that is accepted. When the mission is debated, the focus and practice of management control falls into pieces. Also, when the ontology of the organization is debated, flexibility does not suffice. The proposition is that it is through sensebreaking that a reflective position may be held. That is, a position where everything may be questioned and that this questioning never stops.

The study of the SAF could probably be labeled a study of an extreme case. Extreme cases facilitate theory building because the dynamics being examined tend to be more visible than they might be in other contexts. The caveat, however, is that this particular case study risks becoming anecdotal since the SAF is, per definition, one of a kind. The paper's argument, however, is that the SAF acts as an illustration of the limits (and possibilities) of management control theory and how it is framed as a technology in a milieu that is neither relatively stable nor stable, but rather under extraordinary pressure for change.

This study aims to analyse the influence of digitalisation on the management control function of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). In particular, it aims to illuminate how digitalisation influences management control elements, organisation and roles/competencies and to identify obstacles to digitalisation of management control in SMEs and measures taken to overcome them.

The study is based on guideline-supported expert interviews conducted with 14 financial managers from SMEs in Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

This study reveals the influence of digitalisation on management control elements, organisation, and roles/competencies. The automation and standardisation of management control processes result in new elements for management control, such as strategic support for management. In addition, the increased availability and transparency of data enable the use of instruments within a company that allow for quick analyses of the company's development. Digitalisation leads to the integration of management control into the corporate network and, thus, a change in the organisation of management control. It also triggers the expansion of management control competencies, especially IT competencies. A shortage of internal digitalisation resources, unclear corporate roadmaps, and a lack of managerial experience loom as central challenges for digitalising the management control function. Measures derived from the interviews can help SMEs overcome the obstacles to the digitalisation of management control.

This research is the first interview-based study of the impact of digitalisation on management control in SMEs, potential obstacles to that digitalisation, and measures to overcome those obstacles. Thus, it contributes to the emerging debate on factors that may explain why SMEs lag in terms of the digitalisation of their internal processes.

While the literature on software process improvement (SPI) offers a number of studies of small software firms, little is known about how such initiatives evolve over time. On this backdrop, this paper aims to investigate how adoption of SPI technology was shaped over a ten year period (1996‐2005) in a small Danish software firm.

The investigation is based on a longitudinal, interpretative case study of improvement efforts over a ten‐year period. To help structure the investigation, we focus on encounters that impacted engineering, management, and improvement practices within the firm. The study contributes to the SPI‐literature and the literature on organizational adoption of technology.

The paper finds the improvement effort fluctuating and shaped between management's attempt to control SPI technology adoption and events that caused the process to drift in unpredictable directions.

The experiences suggest that managers of small software firms remain flexible and constantly negotiate technology adoption practices between control and drift, creating momentum and direction according to firm goals through attempts to control, while at the same time exploring backtalk, options, and innovations from drifting forces inside and outside the firm.

Based on the research, the paper recommends substituting the “from control to drift” perspective on organizational adoption of complex technologies like SPI with a “negotiating control and drift” perspective.

The purpose of this paper is to examine why firms governed by the same environmental management standards within an industry exhibit contrasting responses, with some adhering to the letter and others achieving the spirit behind the standards.

Using Arena et al. (2010) as an analytical schema to examine the institutional dynamics behind such contrasting responses, the paper analyses archival and interview data relating to firm strategy, control technology and human expertise in two contrasting Australian forestry firms.

The embedding and decoupling of environmental standards with a firm’s environmental management practices is influenced, first, by the extent to which founder directors and senior management integrate environmental responsibility with the underlying business motives and, second, by the use of organisational beliefs and values systems to institutionalise the integrated strategic rationality throughout the firm. Finally, informed by the institutionalised strategic rationality, the participation and expertise of actors across the organisational hierarchy determine the level to which the design and execution of the eco-control technologies move beyond merely monitoring compliance, and act to facilitate continuous improvement, knowledge integration and organisational learning at the operational level.

This paper responds to institutional theorists’ call for a holistic explanation that considers the interactions among several intra-organisational factors to explain the dynamics behind why some firms decouple while others do not, even though the firms exist in the same social and regulatory context.

The role of information within management is in a state of dramatic transformation. Managers must grasp and act on the implications of this change if they are to maintain their competitive position both corporately and as individuals. Information technology continues to develop at an exponential rate. But it is only an extension of what has gone before, and should be understood and used in this light. Vastly more information relevant to managers is now accessible than ever before, particularly through the use of electronic databases and networks. A selective listing of major business information databases is provided. Individual managers, whatever their function, must learn to take full advantage of the information resources available to them, and do so continuously as part of their management techniques. Organisations must develop an information strategy and corporate structure which ensures the fullest use of internal and external resources. The position of the librarian within this overall task remains well‐placed, although his relevance and role remain very much a question for his own initiative.

Climate engineering management (CEM) as an emerging and cross-disciplinary subject gradually draws the attention to researchers. This paper aims to focus on economic and social impacts on the technologies of climate engineering themselves. However, very few research concentrates on the management of climate engineering. Furthermore, scientific knowledge and a unified system of CEM are limited.

In this paper, the concept of CEM and its characteristics are proposed and elaborated. In addition, the framework of CEM is established based on management objectives, management processes and supporting theory and technology of management. Moreover, a multi-agent synergistic theory of CEM is put forward to guide efficient management of climate engineering, which is composed of time synergy, space synergy, and factor synergy. This theory is suitable for solving all problems encountered in the management of various climate engineering rather than a specific climate engineering. Specifically, the proposed CEM system aims to mitigate the impact of climate change via refining and summarizing the interrelationship of each component.

Overall, the six research frontiers and hotspots in the field of CEM are explored based on the current status of research.

In terms of the objectives listed above, this paper seeks to provide a reference for formulating the standards and norms in the management of various climate engineering, as well as contribute to policy implementation and efficient management.