Management Accounting in an Early Multidivisional Organization: General Motors in the 1920s*

H. Thomas Johnson

Business History Review, 1978, vol. 52, issue 4, 490-517

Abstract: Introduction of the multidivisional enterprise, which has generally replaced the functional or departmental form of organization in the twentieth century, required management accounting techniques that provided both divisional and top management with data with which to evaluate individual managers' performance, company-wide performance, and future company policy. Professor Johnson discusses the development of these controls at General Motors, the results obtained with them in practice, and their alleged shortcomings, especially in respect to division managers' attitudes towards constructive decisions that might tend to limit in the short run the rate of return on the investment entrusted to them. He concludes with some observations on the influence that organization has had on corporate goals.

Date: 1978
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/ ... type/journal_article link to article abstract page (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cup:buhirw:v:52:y:1978:i:04:p:490-517_04

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Business History Review from Cambridge University Press Cambridge University Press, UPH, Shaftesbury Road, Cambridge CB2 8BS UK.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Kirk Stebbing ().