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Every year, new development projects are recommended to be undertaken by various divisional management to corporate management in different multi‐divisional companies. The corporate managements in such companies face a challenging task of understanding and approving these projects. Moreover, divisions’ performance in a particular year may depend upon the short‐term outcome of such projects. Divisional managers may avoid undertaking new projects, especially those with low probabilities of success, but with extremely high rewards, if successful. Thus, risk‐taking attitudes among divisional managers may be affected in such companies. This paper examines these issues. The results were compiled after surveying 30 multidivisional companies in various industries. Results highlight the various strategic decisions found being conducted at the head office level vs divisional level of such companies. Most of the companies were found to place moderate to fairly strong emphasis on a division’s past performance while evaluating the division’s current year performance. The results highlight project failure allowance, type of reward systems used, and corresponding risk‐taking attitude among divisional managers in such companies.

This paper presents the results of a survey of the use of the balanced scorecard in New Zealand companies. The top 40 companies on the New Zealand Stock Exchange (NZSE40) were chosen as the survey population. A 62.5% response rate was achieved. One hundred percent of respondents indicated that they have knowledge of the balanced scorecard. Sixty‐one percent and 65% of the respondents reported that they use a balanced scorecard at organisational and divisional level, respectively. The results indicate that financial performance measures continue to dominate non‐financial measures in terms of importance. In addition to further developing the literature on the balanced scorecard, the research provides opportunities to investigate balanced scorecard implementations in New Zealand in more depth.

During recent years, financial economists have made a significant contribution to the rapid development of a vibrant and growing literature on organization structure and corporate governance. In reviewing the development of this literature, it becomes easy to see how the seminal contributions of Ronald Coase (awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics in 1991) have become the cornerstone of a new institutional economics. In particular, researchers following in Coase’s footsteps have clarified the conditions under which voluntary contracts between private agents can resolve a wide variety of so-called “agency problems.” More than just representing an important discovery of the significance of transaction costs and property rights for the institutional structure and functioning of the economy, Coase’s work has become an important foundation for the theory of contracts and for the whole field of “organization economics.”

Focussing on responsibility theory of management accounting, the purpose of this paper is to test how performance measurements are applied in divisionalised financial service companies. Management accounting theory suggests that two different measures of branch performance should be computed: one to evaluate the economic performance of each branch and the other to evaluate the performance of branch managers (managerial performance). It also advocates that the evaluation of a manager’s performance should consist of only those factors under his or her control. That is, divisionalised performance measurement should be based on the application of the controllability principle, the study also identified the contingent factors that impinged on the selection of performance measures and the allocation of common costs (ACCs) to branches.

Using a survey questionnaire and analysis of financial statements of the 129 respondent companies the application of financial performance measures: non-financial performance measures and ACCs were tested. For the purpose of this study, dummy variables were assigned to represent whether or not an item is used, if an item is used 1 is assigned to that item and 0 if an item is not used. The values assigned were then summed up to represent the total score for each company. Descriptive statistics and regression analysis was performed to test the six hypotheses of the study.

The study found that a substantial majority of respondents used different performance measures to evaluate the performance of their branch managers and the economic performance of branches. Both financial and non-financial performance measures were equally used in measuring the performance of branches and branch managers. The study also found that branch managers do not have full autonomy and control over the allocation of common resources costs which form part of their evaluation, even though accounting theory suggest that. The regression analysis results showed that firm size, liquidity and leverage were the factors that influence the decision to employ financial performance measures, non-financial performance measures and ACC by the respondent companies.

Despite the popularity of the balanced scorecard it is surprising to note that none of the respondents have ever used this as a performance measure. The implication is that knowledge of this performance measure is very low among the respondents. The excessive use of uncontrollable factors in the measurement process can reduce the morale of the staff involve hence steps should be taken to reduce their use.

This is one of the few studies conducted on the application of performance measures in the financial services and also in a developing country setting. The findings would help organisations in both developing and developed economies to improve upon the application of performance measurement techniques in their branches/divisions.

The problem of using management accounting techniques to measure managers' performance in the service sector is examined. The essence of the problem, it is argued, is that organisations are being judged externally on one set of criteria while the internal control system measures a different set of criteria. Using a management accounting perspective the article identifies the dominance of accounting measures in performance measurement and demonstrates how this has led to dysfunctional behaviour of managers. It is then proposed that a control system be developed that aims to achieve organisational control by the specification of a range of control measures. Measures of finance, customer service, resource utilisation, employee attitudes and service development should be included. Furthermore, no one set of measures can be expected to satisfy all organisations, the exact set and relative weighting of each component being determined by the particular organisation's objectives.

Transfer prices are the monetary values attaching to internal transactions between divisions of a company and can be defined in both a narrow and a broader sense. The narrow definition relates only to the value of trade transactions, while the broader one covers trade and non‐trade transactions such as fees for the transfer of patents and technology (Plasschaert, 1979, ). The narrow definition of transfer prices represents the most obvious type of inter‐divisional relationship.

Introduction The growth and development of an individual business may take several forms, from internal growth to acquisition and merger. If development reaches the stage of a multi‐national corporation then complex central or divisional organisational structures will be formed to provide a suitable basis for management control. When a company uses decentralisation of power through a divisional structure they seek the advantages of being large at the centre and small at the divisional level.

The objective of this paper is to analyze the organizational change in 100 of the largest Spanish firms (a new national context) over the period 1993‐2003 (a more recent time period).

To achieve this purpose, consideration has been given to both traditional organizational categories and new organizational forms, such as cooperative multidivisional, competitive multidivisional, and the internal network. Detailed definitions of the new organizational forms being developed by companies are provided in the paper. Thus, these new organizational forms may differ in several aspects, such as the decision‐making process and integration between divisions.

The results show that over this period, Spanish firms experienced a steadily rising trend towards divisionalization. The cooperative multidivisional structure is the one most frequently adopted in Spain, as opposed to the competitive multidivisional form and the internal network.

The systematic study of the distinctive attributes of the new forms of organization, providing accumulated knowledge, is in an emergent phase of development in the international field, and this work seeks to contribute to such development. The nature of the study strengthens the global implications of the work, and the information obtained from top practitioners in these Spanish firms enhances the contribution of the study.

The balanced scorecard, with its associated performance management approaches, has become a widely practised and popular management reporting method in recent times. Moreover, enabling technology, which assists in the delivery and personalisation of corporate performance information, is having a deeper and more rapid impact than ever before. This paper presents a brief comparative benchmarking study of leading enterprise performance management systems. Also, discusses the merits of bespoke Internet technology development and out‐of‐the‐box portal functionalities. An analysis of key business drivers and implementation risks of such approaches is highlighted via a case study example, and concludes the paper.

This paper examines the implications for accounting, information, and control of a growing body of research to develop and empirically test of a holistic model of organizational success and failure in entrepreneurial organizations at different stages of growth. It builds upon previous work by Falmholtz and colleagues on developing a model of organizational success and failure. It also builds upon a perspective previously developed by Flamholtz, which presents a broader view of the role of accounting control systems in an organizational context.

The initial model proposes that there are six key factors or “strategic building blocks” of successful organizations, and the six key variables must be designed as a holistic system, which has been termed “The Pyramid of Organizational Development”. The model together with the growing body of research designed to assess its validity has significant implications for accounting, information, and control.