March 2008
abstract
Gérer & Comprendre
Issue 91
Editorial
By Francis LEFEBVRE
OVERLOOKED…
On the obligation of accountability
By Hervé DUMEZ
CNRS-Ecole polytechnique
The obligation to account in English law
By Henry MARES and St Hilda's College and Oxford
The English notion of accountability is hard to render in French, because it is hard to understand outside a long tradition of jurisprudence. Neither the same as responsibility or liability, nor as the possibility to incriminate someone for his actions, this notion’s relation with these other concepts varies from one field to another. To blame someone — whether a trustee, spy, employee, judge or minister — for his actions, it is sometimes necessary to prove that the person had an obligation to account for them. Recent developments in corporate law, given the rather broad range of information that companies quoted on the stock exchange must provide, could unsettle the finely wrought balance between accountability and responsibility, which has slowly evolved since the English Middle Ages. This article is published in its original language in order to allow readers to discover all the nuances necessary for a full understanding.
Accountability in firms: Theories and perceptions
By Magali AYACHE
Doctorante ESCP-EAP et Université Paris X
What place do theories of corporate management assign to accountability? What perception do parties inside a firm have of it? The responses to these two questions gleaned during a survey of “middle managers” come as a surprise. The theories about how organizations operate have devoted little thought to this concept, and these managers’ perceptions of it are not what we expect. Accountability is perceived as a form of control rather than as a managerial tool; it has connotations so negative that other words are used: reporting, discussing, reviewing, etc. Nonetheless, managers spend their time accounting for their actions but in their own way and at their own pace.
“Building accounts” in a company in the construction industry
By Bertrand FAURE
MCF info-com, IUT de Tarbes, Chercheur rattaché au LERASS (EA 827, Université Toulouse III)
What are the implications of accountability in the building industry, which is continuously adjusting to the business cycle? The example reported herein has to do with budgetary controls at a construction site that was in the red. It sheds light on the interactions between the chief engineer, project director and comptroller as they try to present monthly budgetary reports that take into account the exigencies of both the site and annual budget. The complex dynamics of accountability provide us with a glimpse of an extremely codified system: the budget is built to be validated even if this means “troweling” over rough spots so as to appear responsible. This informal norm of aesthetics in bookkeeping might become a decisive factor for presenting managerial competence.
Ranking hospitals: A new method of accountability
By Aurore SCHILTE
Ancienne élève de l'Ensae
and Etienne MINVIELLE
Médecin, Directeur de Recherches
How to ask those who wield knowledge in a field where trust is essential to account for their actions? This is the crux of the issue in medicine. Not that medical professionals refuse the idea of accountability — on the contrary, the world of medicine has switched from opaque procedures of “self-evaluation” to an overexposure due to the rankings to which the media have given high visibility. Besides, accountability concerns not just expenditures but also the quality of care. Given the proliferation of rankings of hospitals in France, England, the United States and Canada, four forms of accountability have been distinguished depending on whether a person is held accountable to citizens, payers, patients or other professionals. But the situation is continuously shifting. The advantages, drawbacks and circumventions of current hospital rankings lead us to turn toward a new form of accountability that would represent a compromise between “control” over internal controls and the pursuit of democracy.
Researchers and the obligation to account
By Margit OSTERLOH,
Professeur, Université de Zurich Bruno S. FREY Professeur, Université de Zurich
Fabian HOMBERG
Diplomé Kfm
and Universté de Zurich
The New Public Management movement, straight from Anglo-Saxon land, has introduced the idea that public services should be managed like firms and, as a consequence, production indicators be used to measure performance. Research has not escaped this trend and is to be held accountable. This article focuses less on the fundamental question of the freedom of research in universities than on the deviations resulting from the numerical indicators of production to which researchers are now subject. Besides not being adapted to research, these methods risk having a negative impact on creativity. The costs of the obligation to account — loss of motivation by researchers, reinforcement of “normal science”, etc. — might exceed any hoped-for benefits. To improve public research, others procedures, drawn from research in the science of management, are proposed.
IN QUEST OF THEORIES
Orchestrating assets to remain competitive: Raytheon’s strategic trajectory
By Colette DEPEYRE
Doctorante, PREG-CRG & Universté Paris X
En quête de théorie
How to capitalize on the knowledge generated by R&D projects?
By Gilda SIMONI
Chargée de recherche, IMRI - Université Paris Dauphine
Mosaics
Firms do not exist! Invent them!
On Daniel Bachet’s Les fondements de l’entreprise — Construire une alternance à la domination financière (Éditions de l’Atelier, 2007).
By Blanche Segrestin
Disorder and organizations
On Eric Abrahamson and David Freedman’s A perfect mess: The hidden benefits of disorder (New York-Boston-London: Little, Brown & Company, 2006).
By Jean-Marc Weller