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Cath­er­ine Batt

Tenure Track Assistant Professor

Subjects
Organisation Financial institutions Budget Discourse Qualitative methods History

Primary research areas

Man­age­ment Con­trol Sys­tems; Banks
Cath­er­ine's re­search ex­am­ines how banks ad­apt man­age­ment con­trol sys­tems to handle crises, reg­u­la­tion and change. Us­ing lon­git­ud­in­al and com­par­at­ive stud­ies, it traces how these sys­tems evolve across lib­er­al­isa­tion, col­lapse and re­form, re­veal­ing how con­trol re­design sup­ports re­si­li­ence and trust.
Budget­ing
Cath­er­ine’s re­search re­vis­its how and why or­gan­isa­tions budget in today’s fast-chan­ging world. As stat­ic an­nu­al budget clash with mar­ket volat­il­ity, her work ex­plores how mod­ern firms ad­apt budget­ing routines to stay agile, ac­count­able and aligned with long-term strategy.
His­tor­ic­al de­vel­op­ment of the Iceland­ic bank­ing sys­tems
Cath­er­ine’s re­search traces the evol­u­tion of Ice­land’s bank­ing sys­tem from state-led found­a­tions to post-crisis re­forms. By un­cov­er­ing how elite net­works shape con­trol and gov­ernance, she shows how polit­ic­al and mar­ket forces com­bine to pro­duce both re­si­li­ence and sys­tem­ic fra­gil­ity.

I study how evolving sys­tems strengthen gov­ernance in times of crisis.

Catherine studies how management control systems and budgeting practices evolve to help organisations navigate crises, meet regulatory demands and deliver sustainable performance. Her research combines longitudinal, qualitative and quantitative methods to examine how controls shape resilience and legitimacy. 

At CBS, Catherine teaches Management Accounting in the GMA programme and supervises Bachelor's and Master's projects on management control systems and budgeting.  

She received the 2024 DSEB Educational Award for excellence in teaching and outreach. 

She serves on the editorial board of Accounting Open, reviews for international accounting journals, and draws on a decade of industry experience implementing budgets and control systems, experience that grounds her academic work in practice and impact. 

Outside activities

Cur­rently, I have no out­side em­ploy­ments or activ­it­ies , -