Control Practices and Information technology: the case of Collaborative Databases in Product Development Activities

This research seeks to explore some aspects of how control operates as a package of control practices (Malmi and Brown 2008 ; Ahrens & Chapman 2007 a, Chenhall 2003). Given the pervasiveness of technology use today, we aim at developing an approach that takes into account the role of technology. Our results derive from an empirical work made of an exploratory research and a case study in Product Development (PD) activities using a collaborative database (cPDM). We first place the emphasis on an analysis of control practices and how they support collaboration between functions participating in PD. Building on these findings, we start elaborating further an interpretation of how control unfolds using notions of structures and technology-in-practice (Orlikowski 2007, 2000, Feldman & Orlikowski 2010).