This paper investigates the integration between institutional complexity and performance management in the field of performing arts. Prior research has documented tension related to how performance measures and management tools are used in arts organizations, and the conflict is often explained as being a result of the intrusion of business‐like accounting tools into the exercise of the arts. Drawing on the concept of institutional logics, the findings of the current study suggest that a diversity of logics is salient in this organizational field. The performance measurement system is confronted with multiple logics, and the study shows how the role of performance management is shaped by this institutional complexity.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate how the budget, when split into a network of projects, can act as a management tool to balance control with creativity. Design/methodology/approach – A case study is used to discuss the budget in a large Norwegian festival. Simons’ (1995) concept of interactive use of budgets is applied for the analysis of empirical findings. Especially, the authors focus on the design and use of the budget and how it is aligned with the specific characteristics of festivals as economic organizations. Findings – The findings support earlier research which focusses on the need to balance between control and dynamic changes to successfully manage festivals. This study gives a detailed knowledge on how managers use budgets to combine management control with creativity and dynamic adaptions. Originality/value – This study contributes to a detailed understanding of how managers can use budgets as tools to stabilize between uncertainty, creativity and control.

Festivals are an important part of popular culture and have increased in popularity in recent decades. However, they remain relatively unexplored in the accounting literature, and understanding of the use of management control tools in this context is low. This study aims to investigate the use of budgets in festivals. Informed by upper echelons theory, it investigates how individual and observable characteristics of festival managers are associated with variations in the use of budgets. The study is based on a survey of 61 festival managers from 40 festivals. The findings suggest that festival budgets are particularly important in the planning and coordination process but used less frequently for ex post evaluations. The findings also indicate a positive association between a business educational background and the use of budgets for most purposes, with the exceptions of performance evaluation and reward. This paper contributes to the literature on accounting in popular culture in general and in festivals specifically. Through its application of upper echelons theory, it also contributes to the management accounting and control literature, showing how individual characteristics of managers influence the use of budgets.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore the use of accounting when managing the institutional complexities of a festival organisation pursuing financial and social objectives. Specifically, it focuses on how accounting can be implicated in handling a festival’s multiple and potentially conflicting logics. Also, through mobilising the concept of institutional work, the following builds on our knowledge of the importance of what people do, in managing an organisation’s institutional complexity. Design/methodology/approach This paper is grounded in a qualitative case study, for which the primary data derives from interviews, plus examination of internal documents and information in the public domain. Findings The festival studied is commercially successful, though ultimately one of its main organisational goals is to maximise donations to charitable causes. Other goals include: offering an alternative community through music, particularly to the young; fostering new and innovative artistry; and nurturing a festival family that is rooted to a large extent in its army of volunteers. The paper reveals how seeking such goals simultaneously requires the handling of logics that potentially can pull in opposite directions. Moreover, it highlights the efforts of festival organisers to maintain coexistence between the different logics, including the utilisation of accounting, accounts and accountability to facilitate this. Originality/value There are three main contributions of the paper. First, it offers new insight into how accounting can be purposefully used to mediate between potentially opposing logics in a complex organisational setting. Second, the paper extends our knowledge of the use of accounting specifically within a popular culture context. Third, the following adds to recent use of the concept of institutional work to understand why and how people mobilise accounting to handle institutional complexity in organisational settings.

I de siste årene har det i økende grad blitt fokusert på klima og bærekraft. Dette er en utvikling som også har fått økt oppmerksomhet i virksomheters rapportering, og en rekke aktører tar i bruk nye kriterier knyttet til bærekraft i sine retningslinjer og modeller for økonomiske beslutninger. Med utgangspunkt i regnskapsdirektivet har EU-kommisjonen utgitt retningslinjer for rapportering fra store foretak om ikke-finansiell informasjon. I dette kapittelet bygger vi på kunnskap fra utviklingen av finansiell rapportering og kriterier som har blitt utviklet for å forbedre og understøtte denne, og vurderer fundamentet for retningslinjer for rapportering av klimarelaterte opplysninger. Kapittelet bygger på en dokumentanalyse for å belyse grunnleggende forutsetninger om rapporteringsenhet, rapporteringens formål og kvalitetskriterier for ikke-finansiell foretaksrapportering. Dokumentanalysens resultat indikerer at kravene til ikke-finansiell rapportering kan videreutvikles med hensyn til systematikk og konsistens tilsvarende det som er utviklet for finansiell rapportering. Grunnlaget for rapportering av ikke-finansiell informasjon fremstår som uklart med hensyn til rapporteringsenhet, rapporteringens formål og sentrale kvalitetskriterier. Med bakgrunn i analysen foreslås det at det bør utvikles kvalitetskriterier for ikke-finansiell informasjon basert på kvalitetskrav til informasjon IFRS konseptuelt rammeverk for finansiell rapportering. Det er også behov for økt forskning innen ikke-finansiell rapportering.