Påverkan mellan ekonomistyrningen och inköpsfunktionen
En studie av Sandvik och Scania
AbstractTitle:The Impact of Management Control Systems on the Purchaser Function - A study of Scania and Sandvik Authors: Mohammad Reza Akhbari and Johanna Sullivan Svensson Published: 2011 Keywords: Management control, purchasing function, impact, control, control instruments, Key Performance Indicators, measurement, communication and organizational structure. Background and problem formulation: In order for a company?s business idea or vision to be fulfilled, the management of a company needs assistance from various means to intentionally affect the operation in the desired direction. Management control concerns activities of both financial and non-financial character in order to implement the strategy of a company and to reach profitability. Since the purchaser function is responsible of spending 50 percent of a company?s total revenue, the function has an optimal starting point to be a key actor in the shaping and execution of a company?s strategic plan. The management control and the purchaser function can therefore impact each other, and how this appears and why, constitutes the problem that we have studied. Objective: The objective of this study is to examine the impact between the management control and the purchaser function and to explain why it appears this way. Method:To answer our objective we chose to interview and to study two companies in the manufacturing industry in order to compare and draw similarities, as well as differences in how our problem seems in reality. The approach of our study can be seen as deductive as we have built upon theory in order to compare the result with the empirical data when we drew the conclusion. Theory:We have studied a variety of literature and articles that treat the management control system in its entirety and governance within the purchaser function. In our theoretical references one can find Inga-Lill Johansson different perspectives of the use of information in 4 an organization, the aspect of measurement and follow-up on the management control system by van Weele, as well as the theory of the purchaser function as a gatekeeper by Lau et al.Conclusion:The result of the study proves that there is an impact between the management control system and the purchaser function. This influence already occurs when the choices of the control instruments are being made, as these are based on the overall strategy and vision of the company. By doing performance measurements the companies can se whether the impact is negative or positive. We further prove the impact of the purchaser function on the management control based on its location in the organizational structure. Finally we draw the conclusion that the flow of information between the management control and the purchaser function is used as basis for the impact between the two.