Management control is developing as a vigorous area of academic research. New Perspectives in Management Control provided a survey of the area. This second monograph is avowedly critical and constitutes the first sustained critique of management control.

In this Very Short Introduction, John Hendry provides a lively introduction to the nature and principles of management. Tracing its development over the past century, Hendry looks not only at the jobs managers do today and their place in the culture of work, but also provides an insight into modern management theory.

Most managers in most organizations in most countries are men. This book is the first international work to address the relationships between men, masculinities and managements. It examines the processes through which gendered managerial structures, cultures and practices are reproduced. Exploring top and middle managers, entrepreneurs, corporate executives, and public and private sector managers, the book breaks new ground by critically examining the gendered power processes that have largely been assumed and ignored by conventional organizational and management theory. As well as providing new insights into how managements and masculinities may reinforce each other, this challenging book ultimately explores the ways in w

This book analyses the effectiveness of district administration from critical management perspective. Using classical organizational theory and leadership competency framework, the authors conducted a comparative study of two exemplary districts with distinctive traits in India ─ a rural district in the developed state of Maharashtra and an urban district from the underdeveloped state of Madhya Pradesh. The book delves into the dynamics of district administration by breaking down the processes further and mapping the role of the district magistrates on the UNDP competency framework. Given the changing scope and challenges of public service, this comparative analysis of the two districts would provide insights into district administration and would be of significant relevance to administrators and management professionals across the globe in assessing their effectiveness. The book provides an eclectic framework for public administration from an overall sustainability perspective

'All too frequently leadership is depicted as an unequivocal "good". Lemmergaard and Muhr's excellent collection disabuses us of this misleading view, serving as a timely and salutary reminder that leadership is often emotionally charged, toxic, dysfunctional or downright stupid. This book's critical message should be read and heeded by students and practitioners of leadership alike.' Peter Case, James Cook University, Australia 'The book provides a rich kaleidoscope of critical engagements with leadership in all its complexity and ambiguity. The contributors to this collection do not deny the vital role that leadership can play nor the many ways in which it can affect the emotional dynamics of organizations for good and bad. What they do is to shift thinking away from the comforting but misleading simplicities of toxic leaders and inert followers, offering a welcome tonic to the critical study of leadership. The book will appeal to leadership scholars as well as to students and to reflective practitioners.' Yiannis Gabriel, University of Bath, UK This book offers a critique of the field of leadership studies, focusing on the dynamics between post-heroic leadership and the notion of functional and dysfunctional emotions. Situated in the field of critical leadership studies, the chapters of this book set out to challenge the general assumption that emotionality is the antithesis of rationality. The authors expand upon the existing discussions of leadership emotions and reveal how toxicity and dysfunctionality are not merely simple, negatively coercive, or repressive phenomena, but can also have productive and enabling connotations. The book includes comprehensive overviews of traditional leadership thinking and in addition provides readers with critical reflections on concepts such as ignorance, authenticity, functional stupidity and vanity in leadership. As the book presents a series of critical perspectives on how emotions can be theorized in leadership studies, it is suitable for advanced courses in the subject, as well as being a highly interesting monograph for academics in the field.

Within contemporary culture, ‘leadership’ is seen in ways that appeal to celebrated societal values and norms. As a result, it is becoming difficult to use the language of leadership without at the same time assuming its essentially positive, intrinsically affirmative nature. Within organizations, routinely referring to bosses as ‘leaders’ has, therefore, become both a symptom and a cause of a deep, largely unexamined new conceptual architecture. This architecture underpins how we think about authority and power at work. Capitalism, and its turbo-charged offspring neo-liberalism, have effectively captured ‘leader’ and ‘leadership’ to serve their own purposes. In other words, organizational leadership today is so often a particular kind of insidious conservativism dressed up in radical adjectives. This book makes visible the work that the language of leadership does in perpetuating fictions that are useful for bosses of work organizations. We do this so that we – and anyone who shares similar discomforts – can make a start in unravelling the fiction. We contend that even if our views are contrary to the vast and powerful leadership industry, our basic arguments rest on things that are plain and evident for all to see. Critical Perspectives on Leadership: The Language of Corporate Power will be key reading for students, academics and practitioners in the disciplines of Leadership, Organizational Studies, Critical Management Studies, Sociology and the related disciplines.

The book gives an overview of critical research in information systems (CRIS), which will give a useful introduction to those students and researchers not familiar with the topic and assist in carrying the debate further on a variety of issues.

What is the relationship between narrative, society and the forms of control that function in society? This critical analysis examines the role of narrative in the creation of various social realities. The central theme is that narrative is a pervasive form of human communication integral to the production and shaping of social order. Each chapter provides both a theoretical framework and an examination of narratives in a range of communication contexts - interpersonal, small group, organizational and mass media - illustrating the far-reaching impact of narrative on our lives and social organizations.

First published in 1998, this volume of readings provides an overview of the development of the study of Management Control theory over the past 35 years. The period encompasses the publication of a major and seminal text by Anthony and Dearden in 1965, which acted as a touchstone in defining the range and scope of management control systems. This laid management control’s foundations in accounting-based mechanisms of control, an element which has been seen as both a strength and a constraint. A good deal of work has followed, providing both a development of the tradition as well as a critique. In this volume we attempt to provide a range of readings which will illustrate the variety of possibilities that are available to researchers, scholars and practitioners in the area. The readings illustrate the view that sees control as goal directed and integrative. They go on to explore the idea of control as adaption, consider its relationship with social structure and survey the effects of the interplay between the organisation and the environment. The essays included are not intended to lead the reader through a well-ordered argument which concludes with a well reasoned view of how management control should be. Instead it seeks to illustrate the many questions which have been posed but not answered and to open up agendas for future research.