Get 20M+ Full-Text Papers For Less Than $1.50/day. Start a 14-Day Trial for You or Your Team.

Learn More →

The role of technocratic and socio-ideological controls in managing tensions when integrating international subsidiaries

The role of technocratic and socio-ideological controls in managing tensions when integrating... This paper aims to analyse how a multinational organisation uses technocratic and socio-ideological controls to manage tensions arising when integrating its international subsidiaries.Design/methodology/approachThrough interviews and company documentation, the authors analyse how a global German family business firm integrates its international subsidiaries into the corporate context.FindingsThe findings suggest that technocratic and socio-ideological controls in combination help the firm manage three tensions – vertical vs lateral relations, standardisation vs differentiation of practices and centralisation vs decentralisation of decision-making – arising in the course of internationalisation. These results have important analytical implications for the understanding of how a high level of compliance to technocratic control initiatives is achieved. Prior work has, in the main, focussed on the resistance to technocratic controls without paying much attention to compliance. Specifically, the authors show how managers can use socio-ideological control to achieve a high level of compliance among employees when implementing technocratic controls.Practical implicationsThe results suggest that managers in multinational firms need to pay careful attention to the tensions that are created when they internationalise and to apply a combination of technocratic and socio-ideological controls to manage these tensions.Originality/valueThere is limited knowledge of how managers use socio-ideological control to enact a particular form of experience for their employees and to create a highly valued sense of purpose. The findings suggest that these controls, in combination with technocratic ones, serve important roles when organisations expand internationally. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Qualitative Research in Accounting & Management Emerald Publishing

The role of technocratic and socio-ideological controls in managing tensions when integrating international subsidiaries

Download PDF
22 pages

Loading next page...
 
/lp/emerald-publishing/the-role-of-technocratic-and-socio-ideological-controls-in-managing-OT5w0fjHGL

References (57)

Publisher
Emerald Publishing
Copyright
© Emerald Publishing Limited
ISSN
1176-6093
eISSN
1176-6093
DOI
10.1108/qram-05-2018-0032
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

This paper aims to analyse how a multinational organisation uses technocratic and socio-ideological controls to manage tensions arising when integrating its international subsidiaries.Design/methodology/approachThrough interviews and company documentation, the authors analyse how a global German family business firm integrates its international subsidiaries into the corporate context.FindingsThe findings suggest that technocratic and socio-ideological controls in combination help the firm manage three tensions – vertical vs lateral relations, standardisation vs differentiation of practices and centralisation vs decentralisation of decision-making – arising in the course of internationalisation. These results have important analytical implications for the understanding of how a high level of compliance to technocratic control initiatives is achieved. Prior work has, in the main, focussed on the resistance to technocratic controls without paying much attention to compliance. Specifically, the authors show how managers can use socio-ideological control to achieve a high level of compliance among employees when implementing technocratic controls.Practical implicationsThe results suggest that managers in multinational firms need to pay careful attention to the tensions that are created when they internationalise and to apply a combination of technocratic and socio-ideological controls to manage these tensions.Originality/valueThere is limited knowledge of how managers use socio-ideological control to enact a particular form of experience for their employees and to create a highly valued sense of purpose. The findings suggest that these controls, in combination with technocratic ones, serve important roles when organisations expand internationally.

Journal

Qualitative Research in Accounting & Management – Emerald Publishing

Published: Aug 5, 2019

Keywords: Tensions; Compliance; Family business; Multinational organizations; Socio-ideological control

There are no references for this article.