Planning for Control and Evaluation

A fundamental aspect of all management control systems is its capacity to make organisations controllable and possible to evaluate. In a well-functioning management control system—especially one that is “strategic”—it can be expected that the metrics used, decisions being made and the responsibilities for these decisions are supporting strategy formulation and implementation. It is especially important that the structures and processes of the control system facilitate an internal strategic dialogue between managers and co-workers in planning, following-up and evaluating the objectives and strategies of the organisation. The chapter discusses some of the challenges of establishing strategic management control. One such challenge is how to establish a strategic dialogue that will help the organisation to develop in the desirable direction. Another, and closely related challenge, is how to ensure that the strategies chosen are implemented throughout the organisation when controls are not coordinated or aligned. Concepts like integrated control, management control package, control mix and ERP systems are used to discuss these and similar challenges. The discussions are based on our own experiences and insights as well as research findings.

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Stages of management control in a large public organization: from top to frontline managers

Managing Management Controls

Managing through Uncertainty

Notes

The organisation “Beyond Budgeting” strives to move “beyond command-and-control toward a management model that is more empowered and adaptive” (Source https://bbrt.org/what-is-beyond-budgeting/). Traditional budgeting techniques and processes are examples of command-and-control management models.

We strongly believe that the management control package is a pedagogical model that can be used in university courses, as well as by practitioners, wanting to discuss and analyse different controls and how they can be related. For the former use, see for example, the Swedish textbook “This is Management Control.” [in Swedish: “Det här är ekonomistyrning.”] by Nilsson and Olve (2018b). For the latter use, see for example, the Swedish book “The Controller handbook” [in Swedish: “Controllerhandboken”] edited by Nilsson and Olve (2018a), especially Chaps. 1 and 16.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

1. Serus AB, Linköping, Sweden Erik Jannesson
2. Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden Fredrik Nilsson

1. Erik Jannesson