Management Controls that Anchor other Organizational Practices

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Ahrens, Thomas
• 署名单位: United Arab Emirates University
• 刊物名称: CONTEMPORARY ACCOUNTING RESEARCH
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0823-9150
• DOI: 10.1111/1911-3846.12377
• 发表日期: 2018
• 页码: 58-86
• 关键词: performance-measurement systems; INSTITUTIONAL WORK; context; flexibility; DIRECTIONS; strategies; BEHAVIOR; DESIGN; IMPACT; MARKET

摘要

How do management control practices structure other organizational practices? This paper proposes a theory of practice hierarchies. The key idea is that organizations possess constitutive rules that define their character. They are enacted by the practices at the top of the hierarchy. These anchor practices contain objectives and established ways of doing things that control, or structure, subsidiary practices. They do so by defining key social relationships in the organization, often ones that are antagonistic. The paper uses illustrations from a longitudinal field study of a retail bank and draws on insights from cultural sociology.