Behind Uncertainty: Organizational Culture and AIS Quality in Shaping the Effectiveness of Management Control Systems
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.24036/wra.v14.i2.24Keywords:
organizational culture, environmental uncertainty, accounting information system quality, management control systems effectivenessAbstract
Purpose – This study examines whether the quality of the accounting information system (AIS) is an information-processing mechanism through which organizational culture and perceived environmental uncertainty are associated with the effectiveness of management control systems (MCS).
Design/methodology/approach – A cross-sectional survey was administered to financial managers, heads of accounting divisions and controllers of manufacturing firms listed on the Indonesia Stock Exchange (127 usable responses; purposive sampling). Each construct was specified as a composite of the facets defined by its parent framework (Competing Values Framework, DeLone and McLean model (2003), Malmi and Brown’s package (2008) and the model was estimated with PLS-SEM (SmartPLS 4) using bootstrapped direct and indirect effects.
Findings – Organizational culture and environmental uncertainty are positively associated with both AIS quality and MCS effectiveness. AIS quality is positively associated with MCS effectiveness and carries roughly one third of the total association of each contextual factor (indirect-to-total ratio 32.5% for culture, 33.3% for uncertainty), a pattern of complementary partial mediation. Information infrastructure is therefore an important but incomplete conduit: most of the association runs through channels that AIS quality does not capture.
Originality/value – The study’s contribution lies in identifying and testing an information-infrastructure mechanism that connects contextual conditions to MCS effectiveness. Rather than treating the combination of variables as novelty in itself, the study asks whether part of the association between contextual conditions and control effectiveness operates through the quality of the AIS that supplies information for control design, monitoring, and decision making.
Research limitations/implications – The cross-sectional, single-informant, perceptual design supports conclusions about association and consistency with the proposed mechanism, not causation. The results refine the mediating form of fit in contingency theory by showing that information-processing capacity carries part, but not all, of the link between context and control effectiveness.
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Copyright (c) 2026 Muhammad Nawawi, Tri Wahyudi, Kurniarga Bagaskara, Lili Sugeng Wiyantoro (Author)
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