Management control system, organizational learning, and firm's performance: An empirical study from developing economy

Even though it is widely accepted that effective design of management control system (MCS) has the ability to stimulate organizational learning, which ultimately will enhance the organizational performance, empirical research analysis on such relationship in the context of the developing economy, in comparison to the existing literature of the developed economy, is still scarce. In particular, the influence of each of levers of control (LOC) components (belief, boundary, diagnostic, and interactive control) on the organizational learning still lacking with conflicting results. Based on a survey of 129 top managers of the Palestinian listed firms, we examine how different MCS have different influence on organizational learning and how organizational learning ultimately influences the organizational performance. The evidence suggests that neither beliefs system, nor the boundary system facilitates learning. In addition, an interactive control system also has no significant influence on organizational learning, which unlike the case of the developed economy. By contrast, diagnostic control system is the only control system that has significance influence on organizational learning. In addition, the result indicates that organizational learning has a positive influence on firm's performance. This paper contributes to stream of literature from the perspective of the developing economy and provide suggestions for potential directions of future MCS research in the context of the devolving economy. (C) 2016 The Authors. Published by IASE.