Levers of Control and unforeseen events

In the last class of MAC[1] we’ve learnt about the Levers of Control, developed by Robert Simons for the business environment of the 90’s. It consists in four different levers as shown in the figure 1. The Levers of Control are an important tool not only for business management but also to be applied in other fields.

Figure 1 - Levers of Control developed by Robert Simons

While working as a researcher, I can now recognize great part of the Levers of Control being applied to a research environment. I worked mostly with microorganisms and molluscs in their early life stages and the research projects used to have a well-defined work strategy. However, animals or microorganisms didn’t want to cooperate and sometimes the core strategy had to change. In a business such as agriculture, where animals or plants are involved, occasionally unexpected diseases, plagues, or adverse environmental conditions can have a massive impact. The environmental change that we are facing will, probably, have an impact in agriculture. Crops that would grow in a specific area might not grow in the future. Can Levers of Control be a powerful tool to keep businesses strategies alive when facing external unforeseen events?

[1] Management and Accounting Control

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