A third plausible explanation of the unexpected result is that corporate management adapts the company-wide MAS in which the financial structure is a central part to contingency factors influencing the firm as a whole (e.g., environmental
uncertainty, firm size, and business strategy) rather than to particular contexts facing individual subunits.
In other words, the level of detail and the frequency of financial plans and measurement systems may be imposed on subunits by top management, while others (e.g., operations-based information) are subject to subunit discretion.
Only the latter parts can be expected to be adapted to the context of the individual subunit (Drazin & Van de Ven, 1985).