Purpose The purpose of this paper is to empirically explore how the effect of intellectual capital (IC) on organizational performance is indirect and mediated through performance measurement (PM) systems. Design/methodology/approach Data were collected from a survey of 128 chief financial officers of Iranian publicly listed companies. Hypotheses were tested using partial least squares regression, a structural modeling technique which is appropriate for highly complex predictive models. Findings Results from the structural model indicate that, in general, companies with a higher level of IC place a premium on the balanced use of PM systems in a diagnostic and interactive style. Furthermore, the results provide some evidence that IC is indirectly associated with organizational performance through the intervening variable of the balanced use of interactive and diagnostic PM systems. Practical implications This study sheds light on the issue of how senior management should use PM systems to take full advantage of intellectual assets which could lead to improved organizational performance. Originality/value This is the first study of its kind to synthesize a model which examines IC, PM systems, and organizational performance. Although the effect of different types of intangible assets on performance has been substantially examined in the literature, less effort has been devoted to understanding the role of PM systems in leveraging an organization’s IC.

If you would like to write for this, or any other Emerald publication, then please use our Emerald for Authors service information about how to choose which publication to write for and submission guidelines are available for all. Please visit www.emeraldinsight.com/authors for more information. About Emerald www.emeraldinsight.comEmerald is a global publisher linking research and practice to the benefit of society. The company manages a portfolio of more than 290 journals and over 2,350 books and book series volumes, as well as providing an extensive range of online products and additional customer resources and services.Emerald is both COUNTER 4 and TRANSFER compliant. The organization is a partner of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and also works with Portico and the LOCKSS initiative for digital archive preservation. AbstractPurpose -The purpose of this paper is to contribute to a better understanding of competitive strategy and performance measurement in the Malaysian context by applying a modified version of Conant et al's generic strategy scale and categorizing Malaysian firms along the Miles and Snow business strategy typology. Design/methodology/approach -Competitive strategy and performance measurement were assessed via survey. A total of 975 firms were randomly selected from the directory of Federation of Malaysian Manufacturers (FMM) as listed in 2003. Overall, 133 surveys were returned, 120 of which were usable for analysis. Findings -Results suggest that Malaysian firms view competitive strategy differently and are more likely than their Western counterparts to emphasize the use of financial measures of organizational performance. Findings also highlight the difficulties faced when Western measurement scales are employed in non-Western emerging nations. Research limitations/implications -Because greater emphasis was placed on financial rather than non-financial measures, results indicate a statistically significant different improvement only in sales growth and ROI performance among the three strategy categories. Strategy researchers should focus their attention to the use of multiple performance measures in assessing firm's performance as shown by the significant different in the use of customer satisfaction and loyalty measures, as well as employee satisfaction and training measures. Originality/value -These findings hold relevance for executives responsible for the formulation and implementation of business strategy. A better understanding of the relationship between business strategy and performance measures using the BSC perspectives of measures has been provided. The study provides some useful insights into the role of performance measures. In addition, this study conveys the message to top managers and designers of performance measurement tools -most notably the balanced scorecard -should pay particular attention to non-financial performance measures in implementing their organization's strategy.

Purpose-The purpose of this paper is to empirically explore intellectual capital (IC) from a multidimensional perspective and its relationship with organizational performance (OP) within Iranian public listed companies. Design/methodology/approach-Survey data from Chief Financial Officers in 128 companies within Tehran Stock Exchange were collected and analyzed using partial least squares regressions. Findings-The findings suggest that organizational culture plays a significant role in developing human capital and structural capital while trust is a major determinant of all the IC components, namely human, structural, relational, and social capital. The results also confirm that the investment in human, structural, and relational capital could potentially bring about OP improvement in Iranian public listed companies. Practical implications-A synthesis of various sub-elements of IC supports executives in detecting, capturing, and assessing the different kinds of knowledge resources which must be taken into consideration individually for maximizing OP. Such multidimensional and comprehensive conceptualization of IC would assist organizations to remedy the inefficiency in the exploitation of IC and thereby providing a robust system in order to capture and measure IC more effectively. Originality/value-This study combines literature on IC across diverse academic fields. The multidimensional conceptualization of IC with four sub-dimensions (i.e. human, structural, relational, and social capital) as well as supplementing two antecedent constructs (trust and organizational culture) offer a more systematic manner to synthesize several knowledge-based drivers toward performance which have not been addressed simultaneously in a comprehensive framework.

If you would like to write for this, or any other Emerald publication, then please use our Emerald for Authors service information about how to choose which publication to write for and submission guidelines are available for all. Please visit www.emeraldinsight.com/authors for more information. About Emerald www.emeraldinsight.comEmerald is a global publisher linking research and practice to the benefit of society. The company manages a portfolio of more than 290 journals and over 2,350 books and book series volumes, as well as providing an extensive range of online products and additional customer resources and services. AbstractPurpose -The purpose of this paper is to provide empirical evidence concerning: the relationships between decentralization, perceived environmental uncertainty, and management accounting systems (MAS) information and the relationships between MAS information and managerial performance within Egyptian hospitals. Design/methodology/approach -Data were collected using questionnaires that were sent personally to the managers or heads of departments of Egyptian hospitals. Departmental level was used as the unit of analysis. Data obtained from 200 hospital managers were analyzed using partial least squares. Findings -The study reveals that decentralization and environmental uncertainty, to some extent, are essential factors in designing efficient and effective MAS. Hospitals with decentralized structure make better use of timely, aggregated and integrated MAS information. Environment in which the hospitals operate does have significant influence on the type of information provided by the MAS. Research limitations/implications -Using personally administered questionnaires causes the sample to be rather limited and not comprehensive enough.Practical implications -The current study offers the hospital managers some useful aspects related to the function of MAS information that can be used to enhance their managerial performance. The provision of broad-scope and timeliness of MAS information can facilitate more effective managerial decisions. MAS designers and Egyptian policy makers should emphasize on decentralized decision-making by delegating sufficient authority to lower level managers as much as possible.Originality/value -This study is one of the few studies done in Africa in the field of MAS, particularly in the context of Egyptian hospitals.

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PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to contribute to the body of knowledge in the area of performance measurement systems, particularly the BSC framework, by investigating empirically the extent of multiple performance measures usage and their effects on the performance of Malaysian manufacturers.Design/methodology/approachThe paper used a mail‐survey of companies listed in the Directory of the Federation of Malaysian Manufacturers (FMM), year 2003. The FMM Directory provides a database of over 2,000 manufacturing firms of various sizes producing a broad range of products. The FMM Directory was utilized because it specifically covers manufacturers and manufacturing‐related services. A simple random sample of 975 companies located in West Malaysia was drawn. Companies with at least 25 employees and annual sales turnover of at least RM10 million were selected. A total of 120 usable responses were gathered and used in the data analysis.FindingsThe findings suggest that the use of non‐financial measures, particularly, internal business process and innovation and learning measures, appears to be important as it enhances firm performance. More interesting, the findings reveal that the use of multiple performance measures via overall BSC measures contributes to a more positive outcome.Research limitations/implicationsThe paper shows that the FMM Directory is not an exhaustive list, and may not represent the whole population of Malaysian manufacturers. The sample size is not overwhelming and confined to the manufacturing sector only. Furthermore, the use of cross‐sectional data could not find consistent association between non‐financial measures and future performance.Originality/valueThe paper shows that one important practical implication is for the designers of control and performance measurement systems to emphasize the use of multiple performance measures that are fundamental to the success of organizations.

Adopting the contingency theory framework, this study investigated the extent to which Malaysian public listed companies (PLCs) implement environmental management accounting (EMA) and whether the implementation varies across corporate characteristics. Five corporate characteristics, namely, environmental sensitivity of industry, company size, ownership status, Environmental Management System (EMS) adoption and the proportion of non-executive directors (NEDs), were examined. The results, derived from postal questionnaires, indicate that the extent of EMA implementation was moderate and that more emphasis was placed on environmental cost effectiveness activities. The results also imply that complying with environmental regulations is more important than incorporating EMA information into performance measurement, control and reporting. Except for ownership status, the extent of EMA implementation, however, did not vary among corporate characteristics, and thus, provides limited support to contingency theory in explaining the extent of EMA implementation among Malaysian PLCs.

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