Management control

In an incredibly competitive and extraordinarily complex world, the ability to manage information makes all the difference between an organization’s success and failure. In this context, management accounting—whose primary mission is precisely to produce information useful for management—can play a pivotal role. In fact, it plays this role at every level of the organization. First, at the organizational governance level, it contributes to the legitimacy of management practices by drawing attention to organizations’ economic, social, and environmental responsibilities. Then, at the strategic level, through the information it provides to executives, it helps build the competitive advantage necessary for organizations to be truly competitive. Finally, at the operational level, it fuels the ongoing pursuit of productivity—which is the very foundation of resource allocation, activity coordination, and business process management—with its insights.

This book explores the various roles that management control must play in today’s organizations. This exploration takes two approaches. On the one hand, it unpacks the conceptual framework of management control, providing an overview of control practices and offering insight into the challenges practitioners must now address if they want to make a difference that will ultimately make all the difference. On the other hand, the book offers a set of easy-to-complete self-assessment questionnaires that will enable practitioners to fully appreciate the extent of their contribution to the key initiatives of contemporary organizations.

Hugues Boisvert, Ph.D., FCPA, FCMA, Full Professor of Accounting, HEC Montréal, CPA International Chair in Management Control Research

Richard Déry, Ph.D., Full Professor of Management, HEC Montréal