Situated Functionality of Management Accounting Tools within Operational Practices: A Field Study of Physicians Drawing on Casemix

Posted: 10 Sep 2011 Last revised: 10 Jun 2013

See all articles by Anja Kern

Anja Kern

Imperial College London

Aziza Laguecir

EDHEC Business School - Department of Accounting

Date Written: September 9, 2011

Abstract

This paper aims to study the use of management accounting tools for the pursuit of practitioners’ specific intentions. Specifically we aim to investigate how non-accountants enact the situated functionality (Ahrens & Chapman, 2007) of management accounting tools in their operational practice. This question is investigated through a detailed case study on the enactment of casemix situated functionality by physicians in a French Hospital. Drawing on the theoretical framework of Schatzki (2002), we identify that this is done over time and takes the shape of a trajectory of management accounting tools and practice transformations. We find that the same way as rules, teleoaffective structures and understandings are properties of practice, situated functionality is a property of the relation between tool and practices. This relation is recursive and then evolves as tool and practice alter their contours.

Keywords: Situated Functionality Enactment, Management Accounting Tools, Casemix

JEL Classification: M40, M49

Suggested Citation

Kern, Anja and Laguecir, Aziza, Situated Functionality of Management Accounting Tools within Operational Practices: A Field Study of Physicians Drawing on Casemix (September 9, 2011). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1924912

Anja Kern

Imperial College London ( email )

South Kensington Campus
Exhibition Road
London, Greater London SW7 2AZ
United Kingdom

Aziza Laguecir (Contact Author)

EDHEC Business School - Department of Accounting ( email )

France

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