The impact of management controls on public managers’ well-being

Public sector managers are increasingly subject to management controls. In this study, we determine how management controls in public sector organizations influence managers’ well-being at work. Based on central beliefs and concepts in the management control literature and self-determination theory, we develop, test, and confirm a theoretical model predicting that positive effects of management controls on public managers’ well-being are explained by increased role clarity and negative effects by increased control burden, which in turn affects managers’ self-determination. The model was tested through web survey responses from 1,029 managers from ten Swedish local government organizations. Our research contributes to the literature on well-being effects of management controls by specifying how positive and negative effects on managers’ well-being occur.