Gli atenei italiani e gli strumenti di pianificazione e controllo: a che punto siamo?

2012 ◽  
pp. 55-83
Author(s):  
Silvia Cantele ◽  
Martina Martini ◽  
Bettina Campedelli
Keyword(s):  
Control Systems ◽  
Corporate Culture ◽  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Control Process ◽  
Management Control ◽  
Management Control Systems ◽  
Accounting System ◽  
Management Tools ◽  
New Public

Universities all over the world are experiencing a great push towards managerialism; this process is the result of the application of New Public Management principles and practices, but also the request of national law and regulation: modern universities are expected to manage institutional activities in the light of effectiveness, quality and efficiency. The debate on the appropriateness of management tools for universities is placed in this context and is described in the literature with reference to the typical components of management control systems: information and accounting system, organizational structure and control process. The article presents the results of an empirical research on management control systems in Italian universities; the analysis of collected data demonstrates a low dissemination and development of management control tools; in particular it shows that a high percentage of universities is presently implementing only two tools together, and these tools are predominantly generic, while the use of those considered more advanced (e.g. variance analysis and dashboards) is very low. These evidences suggest that the successful introduction of management control systems could not abstract from an adequate development of corporate culture.

Win-win imageries in a soap bubble world: Personhood and norms in extreme work

Organization ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 22 (4) ◽  
pp. 588-605 ◽  
Author(s):  
Susanne Ekman
Keyword(s):  
Corporate Culture ◽  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Project Work ◽  
Soap Bubble ◽  
Individual Agency ◽  
New Public ◽  
Critical Attention ◽  
Reflexive Modernity ◽  
The Empirical Analysis

This article explores the imagery and notions of personhood underlying the willingness to undertake extreme work among creative knowledge workers. The core argument is that extreme work is informed by pervasive win-win fantasies which can be recognized in a number of current organizational trends, ranging from New Public Management, over corporate culture, to project work. Each of these trends claims to transcend paradoxes by making contradictory extremes enhance each other rather than hamper each other. This is partly made possible by an increasing immateriality of both money and labor, I argue. Drawing on empirical data from creative knowledge industries, this article illustrates how ‘win-win’ workers subscribe to a set of norms promising that extreme work is a ticket to Never-Never Land. These norms are progression, passion, indispensability, and individual agency. The empirical analysis shows that win-win fantasies imprison us in ‘irreflexive modernity’, unable to escape the dream. In the end, the article discusses avenues for finding our way back into reflexive modernity through moderation, prioritization, and paying critical attention to the deferral between gain and cost practiced in win-win games.

Budgetary control of Australian police services and the new governance of security

2005 ◽  
Vol 71 (1) ◽  
pp. 71-82 ◽  
Author(s):  
Benoît Dupont
Keyword(s):  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
New Governance ◽  
Management Tools ◽  
Police Services ◽  
New Public ◽  
Budgetary Control ◽  
Hybrid Actors ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Police Activity

Through the example of the Australian police services, this article examines the impact of the New Public Management tools on strengthening administrative accountability. Governments, faced with increasing social demand for security, have launched into political auctions on the themes of police activity and social control. Relationships between the authorities and the police administrators have been redefined, mainly through more rigorous budgetary control. After a rapid examination of the administrative context that led to the implementation of programme budgeting — the main government tool in this area — the article examines the tensions that resulted from its introduction. Particular emphasis is placed upon the limitations of such a tool in the field of security, which is undergoing profound reconfiguration as a result of increasingly frequent cooperation between public, private and hybrid actors.

Understanding public performance measurement through theoretical pluralism

2017 ◽  
Vol 30 (1) ◽  
pp. 15-30 ◽  
Author(s):  
Giovanni Barbato ◽  
Matteo Turri
Keyword(s):  
Performance Measurement ◽  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Management Control ◽  
Public Performance ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Administrative Reforms ◽  
New Public ◽  
Performance Measurement Systems ◽  
Italian Context

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate, through different interpretative theories, the implementation and operation of performance measurement systems (PMS) considering the factors crucial in influencing the development and the operational difficulties of the PMS in a context such as Italy, which is typically unresponsive to new public management-inspired ideas. Design/methodology/approach A theoretical framework is developed through the use of new institutional sociology and management control theory. The empirical study involves the whole ministerial sector, and explores some strategic documents belonging to the new PMS introduced in Italy in 2009. Findings The research illustrates a widespread dissemination of the reform in ministries. However, it has also shown the ceremonial and superficial implementation of the PMS. In addition, the findings confirm that the operation and the actual development of a PMS is strongly affected by the characteristics of the activity under examination. Research limitations/implications The peculiarity of the Italian context limits the generalizability of the findings to countries with similar public sector management and culture. Further studies may investigate the system through an individual perspective, i.e. exploring the role of individual managers in slowing down the operations of the evaluation systems. Originality/value This paper contributes to the debate on the implementation and operation of administrative reforms in legalistic countries also known as Rechtsstaat countries. The use of multiple theories allows investigating the subject matter by considering its complexity in a holistic way.

scholarly journals Measuring the Performance of Local Government Entities and Analysis of their Managers’ and Personnel’s Information Needs in the Context of "New Public Management"

2013 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 123-147
Author(s):  
Ewelina Zarzycka ◽  
Marcin Michalak
Keyword(s):  
Public Sector ◽  
Local Government ◽  
Best Management Practices ◽  
Public Management ◽  
Information Needs ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Management Accounting ◽  
Accounting System ◽  
The Public ◽  
New Public

Ways to make the public sector more effective and efficient have been vigorously discussed for more than thirty years by practitioners and researchers all over the world. Public sector reforms drawing on the paradigm of an entrepreneurial and market style of management are called New Public Management (NPM). However if the concept of managing public sector entities according to the best management practices in the private sector is to be implemented and used effectively, the necessary management-aid tools must be introduced. This particularly applies to the public sector’s accounting system oriented to external reporting, to which needs to be added a management accounting subsystem with cost accounting and budgeting based on responsibility accounting and a measurement, evaluation, and performance reporting subsystem. The main research objectives of this article are the following:  - to identify the management accounting methods and tools currently used by the managers of sampled local government entities (LGEs);  - to identify the information needs of the LGEs’ managers and personnel related to the implementation and application of a management accounting system, and to find out what accounting methods and tools they would like to have at their disposal to improve management processes;  - to evaluate the usefulness, adequacy and effectiveness of performance measurement systems used in LGEs. This article fits into the scope of world research on the implementations of the NPM concept and uses New Institutional Economy to better understand the implementation of management accounting in the public sector.

scholarly journals Mapping strategic groups in higher education: Evidence on the Polish technical faculties

2017 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-15 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michał Pietrzak ◽  
Piotr Pietrzak
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Strategic Management ◽  
Public Management ◽  
Public Universities ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Management Practice ◽  
Strategic Groups ◽  
Management Tools ◽  
Chi Square ◽  
New Public

According to the New Public Management (NPM) concept, public agencies (in such number universities) have to strive for the efficiency analogous to the private counterparts by among others private sector styles of management practice (‘proven’ tools). One of the groups of the ‘proven’ and widely used tools are those connected with the strategic management. Could strategic management tools be helpful for management of public universities? The aims of this paper are twofold: to discuss the potential and usefulness of strategic groups map in the higher education and to test empirically differences of efficiency between mapped groups. This article presents map of strategic groups of faculties of engineering and technology sciences affiliated at public universities in Poland. The investigation was based on the convenient sample of 48 faculties, thus the study should be treated as pilot researches. Following Ward’s method four strategic groups of faculties were delineated, namely: “Scientific Entrepreneur”, “Authors”, “Middlers” & ”Teachers”. Each of these groups is characterized in this article. Then the differences in performance according to the groups’ membership were tested. Based on the chi-square (X2) statistics we find differences in efficiency between strategic groups.

scholarly journals MANAGEMENT CONTROL AND MODERN DECENTRALIZED TECHNOLOGIES

2020 ◽  
Vol 6 (4) ◽  
pp. 98-102
Author(s):  
Petro Kutsyk ◽  
Kostiantyn Redchenko ◽  
Roman Voronko
Keyword(s):  
Control Systems ◽  
Corporate Culture ◽  
Financial Services ◽  
Management Control ◽  
Management Control Systems ◽  
Smart Contracts ◽  
Monitoring And Control ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Decentralized Autonomous Organizations ◽  
The Impact

Modern decentralized technologies, such as distributed registries, blockchain, smart contracts and decentralized autonomous organizations (DAO), are becoming more popular every year. Therefore, the subject of our research, the results of which are presented in this article, is the processes of digitalization in the field of management control and key technologies that allow to organize an effective system of management control in a decentralized organization. The success of management control is determined not only by its ability to identify and correct undesirable deviations in a timely manner, but also by the presence of a special corporate culture based on trust and fairness. Moreover, a positive corporate culture reduces the need for a number of control procedures designed to compensate for the lack of trust within the company. This effect can also be seriously enhanced by modern digitalization technologies. The research methodology included a broad review of literature sources and a comparative analysis of modern concepts of decentralized management, as well as drawing conclusions about promising ways to evolve management control systems. The aim of the study is to identify the impact on management control systems of modern technologies such as blockchain, smart contracts and decentralized autonomous organizations. The authors summarized the experience of applying these technologies in management control systems, which are designed to ensure high individual and team performance to achieve the strategic goals of the company. The conclusion is that the blockchain-based decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) is changing the forms and methods of management control, increasing the role of collective decisions and opening the way for employee initiative. DAO can significantly reduce internal and external transaction costs, including costs associated with the management and operation of management control systems. Different procedures for approval, confirmation and verification, as well as the adoption of standard management decisions are unified and automated. Accordingly, the time and the total amount of effort spent by managers to perform routine actions related to monitoring and control of employees' actions is reduced. Decentralization of control also reduces the impact of administrative procedures and ensures a higher level of trust within the organization. The decentralized model of management control is relevant for various areas of business and management, but special prospects can be seen in the field of decentralized finance (DeFi), where a wide range of professional controllers and users can be involved in auditing smart contracts and identifying shortcomings in financial services.

scholarly journals Evidence-based Nursing in the IED: From Caring to Curing?

2016 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 47 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jette Ernst
Keyword(s):  
Performance Management ◽  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Career Pathways ◽  
Evidence Based ◽  
Management Tools ◽  
Theory Of Practice ◽  
New Public ◽  
And Performance ◽  
Nursing Career

Danish hospitals are major sites of healthcare reform, and new public management accountability and performance management tools have been applied to improve the quality and efficiency of services. One consequence of this is that nurses’ work in hospitals is increasingly standardized through medical evidence. Using Bourdieu’s theory of practice in combination with an ethnographic field study, it is analyzed how the nurses of a Danish Integrated Emergency Department respond to the changing conditions of work. It is illuminated how two opposing approaches to nursing of humanistically and pluralistically oriented caring, and evidence-based scientifically oriented curing inform nursing in the department. The curing approach is however trumping the caring approach. Curing creates new nursing career pathways and is by some nurses embraced with enthusiasm. For others, the new situation creates tension and distress. It is illustrated how the nurses position their practice in relation to the changing working conditions taking sides for either curing or caring, or finding a way to maneuver in between the two. The article argues that the normative enforcement of the curing approach may carry unintended side effects to the goals of quality and efficiency enhancements.

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