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This study examines the interplay of formal types of control (input, behavior and outcome) exercised on municipally owned corporations (MOCs). It further investigates whether particular informal contingencies (trust and interdependence) predict affiliation to the derived municipal control configurations.

The paper applies an exploratory cluster analysis based on survey data from 243 top-level managers of German MOCs. It then investigates the clustered municipal control configurations using binomial logistic regression.

The exploratory analysis reveals four municipal control configurations: (1) input-dominated control, (2) outcome-dominated control, (3) mixed input/outcome control and (4) “neglect of formal control”. As expected, both of the informal contingencies demonstrate strong predictive power. More precisely, trust increases the likelihood of belonging to the dominant outcome control cluster and interdependence increases the likelihood of belonging to the mixed input/outcome control cluster. Surprisingly, the neglect of formal control cluster is characterized by low trust and low interdependence.

The study sheds light on the widely assumed but understudied interplay of different formal controls in hybrid governance settings. Furthermore, the analysis stresses the importance of trust and interdependence when explaining hybrid control configurations.

The paper aims to examine accounting changes in the Ashanti Gold Corporation (AGC) in Ghana over 120 years from pre-colonialism to recent times and whether the framework of management accounting transformations in Hopper et al. (2009) is applicable.

Mixed data sources are used, namely, interviews, some observations of practices, historical documentation, company reports and research papers and theses. The results are categorised according to the periods and contextual factors in the Hopper et al. framework to test whether it matches the data collected.

Despotic controls with minimal management accounting but stewardship accounting to the head office in London prevailed under colonialism. Upon independence state, capitalist policies descended into politicised state capitalism. Under nationalisation, the performance of mines deteriorated, and accounting became decoupled from operations. In the early 1980s, fiscal crises forced Ghana’s government to turn to the World Bank and International Monetary Fund for loans. This period marked a gradual transformation of AGC into a foreign multinational, organised along divisional lines and currently exercises despotic control through supply chain management that renders labour precarious and is neglectful of corporate social accounting issues.

The work challenges neo-classical economic prescriptions and analyses of accounting in developed countries by indicating its neglect of the interests of other stakeholders, especially labour and civil society. Accounting is important for development but the article infers other forms may better serve the public interest.

The paper tests the Hopper et al. framework with respect to a large private multinational in the commodity sector over an extended period, which differs from the case studies drawn on originally.

Recent doubts about whether social systems can be controlled in a cybernetic sense depend upon a view of cybernetics that overemphasizes communication, information processing and feedback at the expense of what computer scientists call preprocessing: the conscious selection and structuring of information to facilitate its processing. Much as rationalization was a complement to bureaucratic control in Max Weber's time, the preprocessing of information, prior to its processing by computer, serves societal control today. Indeed, phenomena like rationalization and symbolization can be viewed as forms of preprocessing; they facilitate the crucial control function of self‐referencing. US census data show a monotonic increase in the percentage of the work force engaged in preprocessing relative to the other informational activities: synthesizing, programming and processing.

The present paper attempts to integrate three streams of alternative approaches to provide a contingency‐based framework to understand the management control systems (MCS) that are operating in call centers. Specifically, the paper's aim is to analyse the work practices of call center employees from three different lenses: the radical approach using Braverman's labor process theory; the Foucauldian approach, which explains the governance of the self; and the naturalistic approach, which explains the governance of the built environment.

The data for the case study were collected by conducting interviews. The data were gathered to identify if the work experience of the call center operators reflects the Tayloristic principles of scientific management, whether their responses reflect evidence of internalizing norms and adjusting their selves to fit to the norm, and lastly whether their work conditions are shaped in the manner described above to facilitate control of their work lives.

Prior academic studies have relied on either one of the approaches and the author's contention is that neither of the theories in isolation can explain the complexities that characterize the contemporary call center operator's labor process.

The study of control and its resistance can add to the understanding of the modern workplace. Since the call center environment is unique, the results of this study may have limited generalizability.

Future researchers can extend the approach used in this research to areas other than call centers that may have similar overlapping paradigms. Such an endeavor will enrich the understanding of complex phenomena, where multiple theories may be espoused to explain a particular research question.

A significant contribution of this study is to recognize that there is concentration of limited control and power in the hands of those who are controlled. Such an understanding may revive the “emancipatory tradition” of labour process theory and though it may not lead to the revolutionary overthrow of capitalism, it may lead to the awareness that strategies aimed at improving the lives of workers within the capitalist political economy are desirable.

This paper aims to analyse how a multinational organisation uses technocratic and socio-ideological controls to manage tensions arising when integrating its international subsidiaries.

Through interviews and company documentation, the authors analyse how a global German family business firm integrates its international subsidiaries into the corporate context.

The findings suggest that technocratic and socio-ideological controls in combination help the firm manage three tensions – vertical vs lateral relations, standardisation vs differentiation of practices and centralisation vs decentralisation of decision-making – arising in the course of internationalisation. These results have important analytical implications for the understanding of how a high level of compliance to technocratic control initiatives is achieved. Prior work has, in the main, focussed on the resistance to technocratic controls without paying much attention to compliance. Specifically, the authors show how managers can use socio-ideological control to achieve a high level of compliance among employees when implementing technocratic controls.

The results suggest that managers in multinational firms need to pay careful attention to the tensions that are created when they internationalise and to apply a combination of technocratic and socio-ideological controls to manage these tensions.

There is limited knowledge of how managers use socio-ideological control to enact a particular form of experience for their employees and to create a highly valued sense of purpose. The findings suggest that these controls, in combination with technocratic ones, serve important roles when organisations expand internationally.

This study aims to analyse the relationships between board processes, board role performance and board effectiveness for a cross-country (UK and Romania) sample of comparable European listed companies.

The research design is quantitative in nature and based on the survey method, a self-administered questionnaire which was send to 342 chairmen of selected Romanian and British listed companies and which contains validated statements measured through a seven-point Likert-type scale and grouped in validated constructs.

This study found further empirical evidence that board processes are stronger determinants of board effectiveness than board characteristics and that board roles mediate the relationship between board processes and board effectiveness. It further confirmed the relevance of the three board processes mentioned by Forbes and Milliken (1999) in their seminal work on board decision-making.

The main limitation of this study is the relatively small number of responses (55), which indicates a reduced reliability and generalizability of the results. However, several steps were taken to assure the homogeneity of the sample, starting with a unique data set of firms of comparable size and industry representation.

This study is useful to board directors and chairmen of listed companies, as it can help them to better understand and manage board behaviour.

This study contributes to the limited body of research that investigates specific board process constructs derived from the small team literature and their effect on board effectiveness.

Explores the relationship between the firm characteristics and the control mechanisms in 85 multinational manufacturing companies operating in Turkey. Takes size, age and country of origin as firm characteristics. Control mechanisms include ownership, board of directors, top management team and training. Size is more strongly associated with control mechanisms than age or country of origin. MNCs have majority ownership in nearly 70 per cent of the firms. Size is inversely related to ownership. Large MNCs have training programmes when small ones do not. Ownership significantly influences the composition of board of directors. The level of perceived control is related to the amount of ownership.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the determiners to create and destroy value in horizontal mergers and acquisitions (M&A) using accounting indicators supposed to influence the new entity’s value.

Using a sample of 90 French listed companies and stepwise regression method, the authors test eight accounting indicators supposed to influence the new entity’s value.

To create value after a horizontal M&A, it is necessary to concentrate on turnover and the restructuring of charges without neglecting the control of debt capacity. To avoid destroying value after a horizontal M&A, it is necessary to concentrate on the control of debt capacity and restructuring of charges in order to reduce financial charges and financial risk. Horizontal M&A also create value through the reduction of investment costs and through tax optimization.

This paper is different from other contributions in that the majority of existing literature concerning the sources of value creation in M&A has been based on abnormal returns or microeconomic data. This paper analyzes accounting data that are likely to be influenced over the long term by corporate decision making. These kinds of decisions influence the firm’s value as well as the long-term gains that industrial investors may hope to obtain.

This study makes a significant contribution to the existing literature insofar as it seeks to divide the sources of value creation into three categories: sales synergy, cost synergies and hybrid synergies. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is also the first study to provide explanations from companies’ accounting data, which can lead managers to a greater vision of post-merger strategy management, reinforcing the mechanism for value creation.

In this paper, the authors empirically and theoretically analyze the scaling and control of talent development to highlight an important part of commercialization in football clubs, especially in the light of a growing transfer market.

Conducting a single case study of a Swedish football club, the authors adapt a view of the club as a “high-intensity” organization (Alvesson and Kärreman, 2004), one that inherently relies on strong identification of employees and the fostering of talent. This view allows us to detail the importance of both socio-ideological and technocratic forms of control involved in the talent development process.

The authors show how socio-ideological and technocratic forms of control were combined to establish the football club as a “talent factory” in the league, as well as the corresponding challenges when scaling talent development activities and how these challenges were handled. In doing so, the authors contribute to the broader accounting literature on talent- and human resource management, as the authors provide an example of how football clubs may commercialize without necessarily violating their fundamental sports values.

Talent management has mainly been studied in terms of increasing player wages and a focus on the cost of talent. As opposed to these perspectives, the authors highlight the revenue potential in developing players in the light of a growing transfer market and the relevance of talent development for the commercialization of football clubs.