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The authors study how enabling perceptions (flexibility, reparability and internal and global transparency) of a budgetary control system are formed, and whether enabling perceptions empower lower-level managers and make them form less negative attitudes about red tape in the organization. This study research is warranted because of the lack of knowledge on how perceptual variation in flexibility, repairability and transparency of a control system within an organization, where managers experiencing the same control system design, can be explained.

Survey data with answers from 211 managers from a large local government organization in Sweden is analyzed with structural equation modeling.

The extent to which the budget system is perceived as having enabling qualities (being flexible, reparable and transparent) is explained by the safeness of the individual manager's psychological climate. This climate is characterized by trust and fairness perceptions in upper management. In turn, enabling perceptions positively affect a sense of psychological empowerment and reduces attitudes toward red tape in the organization.

The authors contribute by identifying an important factor explaining individual-level variability in enabling perceptions of control systems within organizations. Compared to previous research that has taken an interest in the organizational-level climate, the authors theorize about and investigate (parts of) the individual-level psychological climate as an explanation of within-system variability.

The purpose of this paper is to deepen the understanding of adaptive governance, which is advocated for as a manner to deal with dramatic changes in society and/or environment. To re-think the possible contributions of organizations and organization theory, to adaptive governance.

Based on social systems theory this study makes a distinction between “governance organizations” and “governance communities.” Organizations are conceptualized as the decision machines which organize and (co-)steer governance. Communities are seen as the social environments against which the governance system orients its operations. This study considers the adaptive mechanisms of organizations and reflect on the roles of organizations to enhance adaptive governance in communities and societies.

Diverse types of organizations can link or couple in different ways to communities in their social environment. Such links can enhance the coordinative capacity of the governance system and can also spur innovation to enable adaptation. Yet, linking with communities can also slow down responses to change and complexify the processes of deliberation in governance. Not all adaptive mechanisms available to organizations can be used in communicating with communities or can be institutionalized, but the continuous innovation in the field of organizations can inspire continuous testing of small-scale adaptive mechanisms at higher levels. Society can thus enhance its adaptive capacity by managing the role of organizations.

The harnessing of insights in organization theory and systems theory for improving understanding of adaptive governance. The finding that both experiment and coordination at societal level are needed, toward adaptive governance, and that organizations can contribute to both.

The purpose of this paper is to develop further understanding of the interdependence between product and organization subsystems in the context of major projects by empirically elaborating the volume-variety matrix.

Projects are perceived as systems that include a product subsystem (the project outcome) and an organization subsystem (the temporary multi-firm organizational network that produces the project outcome). This study addresses product-organization interdependence by analyzing product and organization subsystem components in terms of their uniqueness and reuse across multiple projects. The empirical analysis focuses on four global renewable fuels refinery projects implemented by Neste from 2003 to 2011. The refineries are based on the same proprietary technology but are unique at the project level.

The findings indicate interesting interdependencies between product and organization subsystems when analyzed at the component level: the findings suggest both diagonal and off-diagonal positions in the volume-variety matrix. An example of an off-diagonal position is a reused organization subsystem component associated with a unique product subsystem component, meaning that choosing the same organization in a future project can be used for acquiring an improved and, thereby, unique product subsystem component.

The study elaborates upon the volume-variety matrix in the context of major projects. The findings related to off-diagonal positions in the matrix provide new knowledge on combinations at the component level where a reused organization can be associated with a unique product, and vice versa. This has direct implications for management of projects.

This study aims to explain the transformation process from using regular enterprise resource planning (ERP) system into implementing Cloud ERP system in the UAE public sector.

The study uses a qualitative case study and analyzes the primary evidences from in-depth interviews with the case organization’s personnel. It conducts a thematic analysis of the interviews’ findings. Furthermore, the study uses secondary and tertiary resources from published sources comprising the case organization’s website and previous studies.

The findings demonstrated that the transformation process to Cloud ERP could result in different practical benefits in an organization’s controlling system, cost reduction and profitability. Conversely, results revealed that the effectiveness of implementing cloud ERP is dependable on the provider’s professionalism; hence resulting in issues related to minimized organizational independence. In addition, the paper’s findings provide evidenced clarifications about the controversial misconceptions of Cloud ERP’s privacy issues.

The paper is exposed to the regular case studies limitations, as the study is a qualitative research studying one case company. Thus, the study findings should be strengthened by future quantitative researches on more companies with implying more statistical analysis.

The paper has important implications for practitioners and decision-makers, as it presents significant and reality-based information about Cloud ERP implementation’s benefits and drawbacks. It thus enhances decision-makers’ ability to make an appropriate and suitable decision about adopting the Cloud ERP in the public sector.

As Cloud ERP is still emerging, this study is one of the very few case studies that discuss and present some experienced benefits and issues related to Cloud ERP implementation in UAE Government. This study also uses transformation theory to analyze the data.

Skills form an integral part of an organization for its efficient functioning. This research study investigates mechanisms to actively persuade employees and organizations to change their attitudes and perspectives towards skills through the design and implementation of a skill-based system. The aim of the project is to know if we can create a skill-focused climate in a software organization through a software system proposed by the researcher and if such a system will help in utilizing in-house employees for new opportunities rather than hiring new employees. Feedback was collected on the proposed skill-based system from software professionals and human resource managers through an online survey. Findings reveal that the proposed skill-based system will create a skill-focused climate in a software organization and also help in better utilization of internal employees for new skill requirements rather than directly hiring external employees.

The purpose of this study is to explore what design principles need to be considered in Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems for humanitarian organizations (HOs) to enable agile, adaptive and aligned (Triple-A) humanitarian supply chain capabilities and digitize humanitarian operations.

This study follows an embedded case study approach with a humanitarian medical relief organization, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), which engaged in a multiyear ERP design at its humanitarian field missions.

This research shows that ERP systems for humanitarian organizations should be designed as unique systems addressing humanitarian organizations' challenges and unique missions, their value generation processes, and resource base in an effort to improve organizational performance. This study presents 12 general design principles that are unique for humanitarian organizations. These design principles provide a high-level structure of guidance under which specific requirements can be further defined and engineered to achieve success.

The results of this study are based on a single case study limiting generalizability. However, the case study was analyzed and presented as an embedded case study with five autonomous subunits using different business processes and following different adoption and implementation approaches. Therefore, the findings are derived based on considerable variance reflective of humanitarian organizations beyond MSF.

This study recognizes that HOs have unique routines that standard commercial ERP packages do not address easily at the field level. The primary contribution of this research is a set of design principles that consider these unique routines and guide ERP development in practice. National and international HOs that are planning to implement information systems, private companies that are trading partners of HOs as well as vendors of ERP systems that are looking for new opportunities would all benefit from this research.

This study fills the gap in the humanitarian literature regarding the design of ERP systems for humanitarian organizations that enable Triple–A supply chain capabilities and it advances the knowledge of the challenges of ERP design by HOs in the context of humanitarian operations.

This case study aims to report a longitudinal analysis of the development and use of local “vernacular” accounting practice and a digital rolling-forecast system known as TeamBudget in a public sector organization.

The study employs the constructive research approach which utilizes participative observation in the development of TeamBudget over the 15 years since 2004. The empirical data utilized includes eight interviews and documentary data for the system created.

The study demonstrates how the actions of employees responsible for developing a locally relevant financial planning system, TeamBudget, facilitated the emergence of new accounting routines associated with the newly created system. A locally created accounting system thus became institutionalized into a wider organizational setting over time. The current study presents findings that explain the routinization of informal accounting activities and the subsequent institutionalization process.

Understanding the potential influence of local action on the organization-wide accounting system may foster the creation of accounting tools that could spread participation and commitment throughout a public sector organization, contributing towards enhancing the enabling effect of an organizational accounting system. When designing a local budgeting system, decoupling it from the organizational system may promote its institutionalization.

Antecedents of informal accounting routines have received little research attention. This study illustrates actions relating to local accounting practice were antecedents of accounting routines and subsequent institutional changes in broader organizational practices in a public sector organization. The study demonstrates how vernacular accounting practice can facilitate the institutionalization process.

The aim of this study is to empirically explore and analyze the concrete tasks of output measurement and the inherent challenges related to these tasks in a traditional and autonomous professional public work setting – the judicial system.

The analysis of the tasks is based on a categorization of general performance measurement motives (control-motivate-learn) and main stakeholder levels (society-organization-professionals). The analysis is exploratory and conducted as an empirical content analysis on materials and reports produced in two performance improvement projects conducted in European justice organizations.

The identified main tasks in the different categories are related to managing resources, controlling performance deviations, and encouraging improvement and development of performance. Based on the results, key improvement areas connected to output measurement in professional public organizations are connected to the improvement of objectivity and fairness in budgeting and work allocation practices, improvement of output measures' versatility and informativeness to highlight motivational and learning purposes, improvement of professional self-management in setting output targets and producing outputs, as well as improvement of organizational learning from the output measurement.

The paper presents empirically founded practical examples of challenges and improvement opportunities related to the tasks of output measurement in professional public organization.

This paper fulfils an identified need to study how general performance management motives realize as concrete tasks of output measurement in justice organizations.

As part of a national plan to govern professional and organizational development in Norwegian specialist healthcare, the country’s hospital clinics are tasked with constructing development plans. Using the development plan as a case, the paper analyzes how managers navigate and legitimize the planning process among central actors and deals with the contingency of decisions in such strategy work.

This study applies a qualitative research design using a case study method. The material consists of public documents, observations and single interviews, covering the process of constructing a development plan at the clinical level.

The findings suggest that the development plan was shaped through a multilevel translation process consisting of different contending rationalities. At the clinical level, the management had difficulties in legitimizing the process. The underlying tension between top-down and bottom-up steering challenged involvement and made it difficult to manage the contingency of decisions.

The findings are relevant to public sector managers working on strategy documents and policymakers identifying challenges that might hinder the fulfillment of political intentions.

This paper draws on a case from Norway; however, the findings are of general interest. The study contributes to the academic discussion on how to consider both the health authorities’ perspective and the organizational perspective to understand the manager’s role in handling the contingency of decisions and managing paradoxes in the decision-making process.

This paper considers supply chain management organizations with the aid of 'chaotic systems theory' developed originally in physics and mathematics. Since innovations in supply chain management are vital for organizational survival 'complex systems theory' may assist in fine-tuning managerial philosophies that provide stability in supply chain management because it is on the boundary of chaos that the greatest innovational creativity occurs. Neither 'management by rigid objectives' (MBO) nor 'management by instruction' (MBI) will be suitable for the information society of the twenty-first century because chaotic social systems will no longer be effectively managed. However, the capacity for self-organization will be derived essentially from how supply chain management members accept a shared set of values or principles for action-'management by values' (MBV). Complex systems theory deals with systems that show complex structures in time or space, often hiding simple deterministic rules. This theory holds that once these rules are found, it is possible to make effective predictions and even to control the apparent complexity. The state of chaos that self-organizes is attributable to the appearance of the 'strange attractor' and provides the ideal basis for creativity and innovation in the twenty-first century. In the self-organized state of chaos, social members are not confined to narrow roles and gradually develop their capacity for differentiation and relationships, growing progressively towards their maximum potential contribution to the efficiency of the organization. In this meaning, values act as organizers of 'attractors' of disorder, which, in the theory of chaos, are systems represented by usually regular geometric configurations that predict the long-term behavior of complex systems. In supply chain management organizations (as in all kinds of social systems) the initial principles end up as the final principles in the long term. An attractor is a model representation of the behavioral results of the system. The attractor is not a force of attraction or a goal-oriented presence in the system; it simply depicts where the system is heading based on its rules of motion. In supply chain management organizations that cultivate or shares values of autonomy, responsibility, independence, innovation, creativity, and proactivity, the risk of short-term chaos is mitigated by external complexities that organizations are currently confronting. The strategy is to alter the supply chain management's surroundings so that they can benefit from management by values (MBV).