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Publication date: 7 September 2023

Christopher Chapman, Asako Kimura, Norio Sawabe and Hiroyuki Selmes-Suzuki

This paper aims to explore how researchers in general, and field researchers in particular, might respond to systems of governance of the researchers' activity in ways that can…

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Abstract

Purpose

This paper aims to explore how researchers in general, and field researchers in particular, might respond to systems of governance of the researchers' activity in ways that can support rather than distort the quality of the research.

Design/methodology/approach

We draw upon literature on serendipity to develop a framework for engaging with the positive and negative potentials of systems of governance. We ground our analysis in discussion of participation in the field comprising two parts: first, the examination of our own activities and second, the accounts of participation found in two career-autobiographical interviews with emeritus professors of management accounting from Japan.

Findings

We highlight the potential for a productive tension between two contrasting perspectives that researchers might take on governance of their activity. A contractual perspective sees the value of targets and detailed pre-planning. A reflexive perspective sees the value of exploring the unexpected and considering many alternatives. We offer a framework for considering serendipity and the conditions that facilitate serendipity to help researchers maintain a productive tension between these perspectives.

Research limitations/implications

We build upon retrospective accounts of two successful individuals whose careers evolved in a specific context. The intention is not to set out what might be generally achievable in a research career, nor to propose specific lines of action or planning in relation to specific systems of governance, since these vary across countries and over time. Rather, the paper draws on these materials to illuminate the more general challenge of preparing for serendipity in a way that goes beyond simple opportunism.

Originality/value

We analyse how researchers' mindfulness of serendipity and the nature of contexts that facilitate serendipity can encourage a productive tension between contractual and reflexive perspectives on governance of academic activity.

Details

Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, vol. 37 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0951-3574

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Article
Publication date: 28 October 2013

Sumitaka Ushio and Yasuyuki Kazusa

– This paper aims to examine the processes through which accounting calculations are formed and developed in a Japanese manufacturing company.

676

Abstract

Purpose

This paper aims to examine the processes through which accounting calculations are formed and developed in a Japanese manufacturing company.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper is based on an in-depth longitudinal case study. Actor network theory is used to analyze the empirics and to trace the historical translation process where the calculations were formed and developed as inscriptions.

Findings

The empirics show that an accounting calculation (called PPH) was formed and developed as a flag to rally around to involve different interests at different times. It translated changing external social and economic contexts as well as internal managerial and shop-floor interests into its calculations at different stages of the company's development. The processes were inscribed in the form of an accounting calculation and these inscriptions were accumulated, rather than replaced or abandoned, to create growth rings of accounting calculations as chronological network effects.

Originality/value

The case in this paper demonstrates that keiei-rinen (management philosophy) control can be more bottom-up than implied in the extant literature. Shop-floor workers and non-accounting experts participate in (re)shaping processes of accounting calculations. In these processes, “stability” is the key for the calculations to remain at the centre of translation attracting various interests and linking different demands over time.

Details

Journal of Accounting & Organizational Change, vol. 9 no. 4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1832-5912

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