Enacting formal controls in information system development: Process guidance and goal importance

The complementarity of control formalization and control flexibility: The contingent effects of competitive turbulence

“…Furthermore, our findings support the facilitative view and, therefore, the prevalence of an enabling style of control formalization. The literature in information systems has identified that different styles of control enactments (styles of implementation) influence effectiveness (Shinkle et al, 2021; Wiener et al, 2016). We, therefore, encourage research on different styles of control enactments in general management contexts.…”

“…The literature suggests that the primary reason for organizations to formalize control processes is to gain efficiency (Ahrens and Chapman, 2004; Gopal and Gosain, 2009). Formalized control processes increase the development, communication, and enforcement of rules and procedures that provide employees direction and guidance (Cardinal, 2001; Shinkle et al, 2021). Adler and Borys (1996) identified two views of formalization from the employee perspective—coercive and enabling.…”

The efficacy of organizational control interactions: External environmental uncertainty as a critical contingency

“…In the situation of alignment between behavior and outcome control, behavior control establishes procedural boundaries that efficiently guide controlees toward the desired outcomes defined by outcome control (Davis et al, 2009;Kreutzer et al, 2015;Simons, 1995). Moreover, outcome control likewise motivates controlees to adhere to the procedures in behavior control that are designed to efficiently achieve the desired outcomes (Shinkle et al, 2021;Weibel, 2010). Thus, in the context of low environmental uncertainty, given the sufficiency of reliable information, behavior and outcome controls have a high propensity to be well aligned, resulting in complementarity (i.e., more of one increases the effectiveness of the other).…”

The impact of platform flexibility and controls on platform attractiveness: an empirical study from the seller's perspective

“…These findings provide a contingency explanation and suggest that the positive combining effect of formal and informal control may dissipate when the platform is highly flexible and supports explorative initiatives and dynamic adaptation. PF increases uncertainty and complexity (Liu, 2015;Yang et al, 2022) and under such circumstances, control mechanisms tend to constrain relationship variation and autonomous behaviors (Kreutzer et al, 2016;Shinkle et al, 2021), mitigating the positive effects of flexible modular designs.…”