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The purpose of this paper is to apply quality management tools and practices in the design of an integrated accreditation model for Local Health Trusts, in order to contribute to the sustainability of the Portuguese Primary HealthCare Service. Following the guidelines of the Portuguese Health Quality Strategy, the proposed model is an adaptation of the model from Agencia para la Calidad Sanitaria de Andaluzia.

The development of the integrated accreditation model was based on a literature review, complemented with observation and analysis of the usual working methods in a Local Health Trust (Western Oporto Health Trust).

Local Health Trusts include not only clinical management units but also non-clinical administrative units. Therefore, the National Model for Accreditation of HealthCare Institutions is not easily or directly applicable to them. To overcome this problem, the model proposed in this study incorporates ISO 9001 principles, widely accepted regarding organizational management. The success of the application of this model is highly dependent on the ability of public Primary HealthCare organizations to deal with potential problems such as resistance to change, lack of leadership and inadequate people management and involvement.

The integrated accreditation model proposed in this research is expected to promote the cohesion of Local Health Trust units, encouraging integrated quality management practices and continuous improvement strategies, leading Local Health Trusts, Primary Care and HealthCare in a global perspective toward sustainability.

The purpose of this paper is to extend management innovation theory and research by going beyond analysis at a single level. Focussing on management innovation at the lower level in the organizational hierarchy, the authors develop a multilevel framework; in doing so, the authors answer earlier calls for a study of the effects of multilevel transformational leadership (TFL) on management innovation and innovation in general.

This study collected multisource and multilevel data from 169 managers, 423 employees of 141 units from 21 banking service firms in an emerging economy.

The results from hierarchial linear modeling analysis reveal that unit-level TFL was positively related to unit-level management innovation. Furthermore, firm-level TFL was positively associated with firm-level empowerment climate, which in turn enhanced unit-level management innovation. In addition, firm-level empowerment climate strengthened the relationship between unit-level TFL and unit-level management innovation. Finally, the unit-level trust mediates the relationship between firm-level empowerment climate and unit-level management innovation.

Firms operate more effectively when they generate management innovation. To help ensure the effectiveness of management innovation, it is essential that firms, especially those from the banking sector, encourage their managers to engage in TFL behaviors. The managers must consider how to utilize their TFL behaviors to create trusting relationships in order to achieve the organizational goals. Firms can also take steps to develop a supportive climate of higher levels of autonomy, delegation, freedom and task accountability, in order to promote higher levels of trust at the lower levels of the organizational hierarchy.

The current study develops and tests a mediation model that links firm-level TFL to unit-level management innovation, and identifies unit-level trust as the intermediate outcome. With this theorizing and the findings, the authors deepen the current knowledge regarding the organizational implications of TFL behaviors for management innovation.

The paper explains the principles and approach taken to introduce the general management philosophy into a community unit; and the way in which it has been implemented is also addressed. The paper also demonstrates how a management educator and practising manager have worked together in an action research mode not only to plan the ‘what’ but also the ‘how’.

We utilise the actor-network theory (ANT) – based especially on Latour (2005) – to examine how management accounting tools affect physicians’ representations and new managerial practices in French public hospitals currently undergoing reform.

We conducted a longitudinal case study – based on interviews and observations – in a large French public hospital in which dashboards are diffused to physicians and nurses dealing with both medical and managerial activities.

The case shows that head physicians and nurses are implicated in their new managerial tasks and spend time analysing dashboards. Management accounting tools thus play a role, as mediators, in organising new managerial practices, and dashboards are a means of materialising and giving structure to new managerial practices and enabling discussions and exchanges to take place between actors who were previously separated.

The case shows that management accounting tools are not necessarily useful because they help in decision-making or control – as in the dominant paradigm; rather, they are beneficial because they may help in changing representations and building a new collective organisation. Future research should therefore expand on the organisational and social roles of management accounting tools, especially in the healthcare field.

Most ANT-inspired studies in management accounting focus on explaining changes in accounting practices, which are perceived as a consequence of an ANT process. This chapter, however, analyses the practices by which management accounting tools act as a vehicle to organisational change.

This paper aims to assess the utility of an approach to the design of multiple Balanced Scorecards within large/complex organisations, consider the relevance of “emergent strategising” in this kind of strategy implementation and explore project organisation and wider coordination issues that impact this type of work.

A “research-oriented – action research” approach has been adopted, comprising qualitative observations of an ongoing programme within a major organisation in the Middle East. The case is based on feedback obtained from key actors (participants, facilitators) and the analysis of documentation produced by the project.

Over four years, the project engaged directly with over 200 managers from the organisation’s 35 most senior management units. Its purpose was to align the strategic aims of each unit with those of the organisation and introduce a new form of strategic control. The paper shows that consensus-forming and creation of locally relevant strategic agendas can be usefully and successfully embedded in a large-scale strategic control and alignment programme. The paper notes the large resource implications and duration of such programmes, and the challenges of integrating the resulting processes with those already in place. The paper concludes that for the case organisation, the resource investment appears to have generated useful outcomes.

The project relates to a continuing programme within the client organisation that was not explicitly established before it started as an action-research activity. This has limited and constrained the quality of the information reported.

The scale of the project, the use of design methods that emphasis consensus forming and local relevance provide novel information and insights.

This paper aims to explore management control structure change related to the development of a shared service centre (SSC).

The paper explores a transaction costs economics perspective (TCE‐perspective) on management control structure change related to the development of an SSC. Particularly, it explores and challenges the scope of such a perspective both in terms of contents (i.e. the nature of management control related to the dimensions of transactions) and process (i.e. the way change is effectuated). It does so by theorizing as well as empirically investigating management control structure change through a case study at PCM (a Dutch newspaper publisher).

The theoretical analysis broadens existing frameworks of management control structures by particularly pointing to the possibility of including governance structures for internal transactions and exit threats (connected to a market mechanism) in the management control structure of an organization. However, the paper's empirical investigations challenge the broader framework: the possibility of an exit threat was not explicitly considered by top management (“the designer” of management control). More profoundly, empirical investigations challenge the calculative approach of the change and show that the change in management control is to a large extent a drifting process.

An instrumental calculative approach towards SSC‐related management control change should be complemented with a relational perspective on such change, in order to further explore its drifting character.

A transaction costs economics approach to change in management control might provide practitioners with insights into the efficiency of specific management control structures.

The paper contributes to the extant knowledge by both exploring and challenging a TCE‐perspective on SSC‐related changes in management control.

The aim of this paper is to provide insights into the links between managerial accounting, as a tool for monitoring and governing multinational hotel companies, and corporate management approaches.

The paper builds upon an extensive survey of general managers previously published by the authors, followed up with interviews and an in‐depth analysis of different management scenarios in the context of multinational hotel companies.

This paper's findings suggest that “management by values” appears to be particularly adapted to multinational hotel companies, because of their organisation features, i.e. a network spread in different environments, and partially shapes the management accounting choices of performance indicators at various levels in the organisation.

The limitations of this research would depend on the limited amount of data collected, i.e. 13 interviews, of which eight are analysed, if there were any attempt to generalise the findings.

Implications are both theoretical and practical: the former refer to avenues of further research being opened within this paper, the latter refer to the suggestion that managers in multinational hotel companies might begin to question their own organisations and consider reflecting upon their management approach, in light of the insights provided in this paper.

This paper fits with the established literature on management accounting, but also points towards new connections with the corporate management literature.

The purpose of this paper is to study the adoption and motivation to adopt global spare parts practices in autonomous units servicing the products of an original equipment manufacturer.

The methodological approach is case study investigating the reasons for different levels of use and the perceptions regarding the benefits of a centralized supply chain management in four representative service units.

Autonomous spare part units often source locally because local suppliers are easy to work with in terms of purchasing processes and have no requirements for systematic planning and control of spare parts purchases and inventory management. However, increasing the share of centrally sourced and managed spare parts in the supply chain brings advantages in terms of lower total cost and higher availability. From the perspective of individual subunits engaged in providing product support services, this advantage of relying on a centrally managed spare parts supply chain of an original equipment manufacturer is not self-evident. Autonomous units frequently choose to continue sourcing spare parts from alternative sources, undermining the economies of scale attainable through the original equipment manufacturer’s supply chain. Higher levels of use are facilitated by back-office purchasing management at the unit level. The positive perceptions of centralized supply management in general – including the relationship between the supply unit and the service unit – further facilitate adoption, while local requirements and practices inhibit it.

The study is a single case study and presents proposals requiring further study of the reasons for the observed differences in use of centralized supply chain management.

Centralized spare parts management service requires investment in back-office resources at the service unit level.

The research increases the practical relevance of existing research through an empirical investigation on the autonomous units’ motivations for and perceived benefits of centralized spare parts supply.

This case study aims to present a viable solution to how organizations can adapt and customize the ISO 31000:2009 enterprise risk management framework to suits its needs and requirements.

Approach used for this case study is via adopting Six Sigma DMAIC (Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve and Control phases) methodology.

Key finding is the importance of stakeholders’ feedbacks which are taken into consideration during the designing of the new customized enterprise risk management framework, integrated with all supporting processes, tools and resources.

The ISO 31000:2009 enterprise risk management framework dictates that it is not a one-size-fits-all. Rather, organizations who wish to adapt this framework need to customize accordingly, but there is no indication on how organizations can do it. This case study presents a viable solution to this challenge.

In the next millennium there will be more large firms in the hospitality industry, and these large firms will get larger. But despite the fact that we have had such chains for nearly 50 years, we know remarkably little about the operational management of chains. This article considers the importance of chain operations and reviews alternative theoretical perspectives on how such chains should be managed. It proposes a new model of multi‐unit management based around six key activities – integration, location, configuration, organisation, implementation and adaptation.