Lean Manufacturing and Degree of Alignment of Management Control Systems in France
The aim of this paper is to investigate whether management control systems change to support a lean manufacturing strategy. All statistical treatments were performed on a sample of 171 French manufacturing firms where lean manufacturing is formally implemented. Our results show that only trained firms arrive to a total alignment of practices. This alignment is a 2-steps/2-floors procedure. The first step consists in management control practices alignment (employee empowerment and visual measures) to the shop floor. The second step consists in management accounting practices alignment (VSC, simplify reporting and inventory tracking) to the hierarchical level. Nevertheless, the effect of the time dimension can be reduced by the intensity with which lean manufacturing is put into place.