۱٫ Determinants of the controlling function

۲٫ The competitive challenge of controlling

۳٫ Conclusion and outlook

References

The complexity of today’s business increases and, correspondingly, the requirements for decision support increase. A traditional supplier of top management decision support is the controlling function. However, when controlling struggles to meet the increased requirements, the influence of controlling on top management decisions can get marginalized and eventually vanishes. This paper analyses this observation based on recent surveys and statistics and suggests solutions to master the “competitive challenge of controlling”.

۱٫ Determinants of the controlling function

Recent megatrends such as increasing complexity, volatility, internationalization and increased demand for transparency and compliance have changed the expectations towards the controlling function (Laval, 2015a). As there are no legal requirements on how to organize controlling, the actual set up depends on the requirements of the company’s management. This provides the controlling department with the possibility as well as the responsibility to adapt its services in a flexible manner to the operative and strategic needs that the company faces. In the following, multinational production companies were defined as large production companies with more than 20,000 employees operating and producing in multiple countries with an annual sales volume exceeding 1,000 million EUR (see figure 20: The headcount of controlling depends on company size). Based on the surveys analyzed, the controlling function in such companies employs on average more than 60 controllers or 0.3% of the total headcount (Gräf & Horváth & Partners, 2014). The number of maintained controlling specializations is seven, with an imbalance towards production controlling (Gräf & Horváth & Partners, 2014). In comparison with small companies, multinational production companies regularly apply strategy-oriented planning and controlling tools (Littkemann, Reinbacher, & Baranowski, 2012). In 65% this sized companies, the head of controlling reports to the CFO (Gräf & Horváth & Partners, 2014).