Management Control for Market-Driven Innovations: The Role of Calculative Practices in a Stage-Gate Development Process

Sammanfattning: The perception of how to use management control for innovation has shifted over time, from first being seen as detrimental, to researchers recognising its facilitative potential (Ylinen & Gullkvist, 2014; Chenhall & Moers, 2015). Previous research has investigated the role of calculative practices in an innovation setting, finding that also formal calculative controls can be enabling (Mouritsen, Hansen, & Hansen, 2009; Revellino & Mouritsen, 2015). Furthermore, previous studies have shown how a stage-gate model can provide enabling control in the innovation process (Jørgensen & Messner, 2009). This study contributes to the earlier literature by investigating the role of calculative practices within a stage-gate product development process, thereby synthesising the two concepts. Using a case-study of a highly innovative and successful industrial company, InduCorp, this study investigates the issue in a context of a purely market-driven business using the concepts of bottom-up and top-down management to understand why and how the calculative practices functioned in the development process. This study provides three distinct contributions. First, we show that a calculative practice can assume different roles in different phases of the development process; shifting shapes according to organisational needs. Second, we argue that the structure of the project team is able to impact the role and function of the stage-gate as a control tool. Third, we provide empirical evidence on how management control and calculative controls work in the specific context of market-driven innovations.