Management control in the small business context

Abstract

The purpose of this research is to investigate the process of implementation of a Management Control System (MCS) in a small business context. This topic has been somehow neglected by mainstream academic literature. Papers on major research journals focus on MCS from the perspective of large businesses, overlooking the specificities of small companies (Jänkälä, 2007). Indeed, most of the literature is rooted in the Anglo-Saxon economic environment, whose capitalistic infrastructure hinges on larger corporations. Moreover, when these researches emphasise MCS in small firms, these are usually young and rapidly growing start-ups, rather than established small and medium enterprises (SME). On the other hand, small companies are the backbone of the continental European economic reality, especially in the Italian context, representing 98.8% of our business population. Through the analysis of the relevant literature, we will investigate whether small companies use MCS and to what extent, to define the peculiar elements of management control in these settings. In the second part of this study, we will concentrate on the case of Cielle, a small Italian manufacturing company trying to adopt a MCS, to understand the practical issues of designing and implementing management control in this context.