Chapter 1
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The institute of Management Accountants has
defined management accounting as:
A value-adding continuous improvement process of
planning, designing, measuring, and operating both
nonfinancial information systems and financial
information systems that guides management
action, motivates behavior, and supports and
creates the cultural values necessary to achieve an
organizations strategic, tactical and operating
objectives.
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Management accounting provides both financial
information and nonfinancial information
The role of management information supports
strategic (planning), operational (operating), and
control (performance evaluation) management
decision making
In short, management accounting information is
pervasive and purposeful
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Examples of management accounting information
include:
The reported expense of an operating department,
such as the assembly department of an automobile
plant or an electronics company
The costs of producing a product
The cost of delivering a service
The cost of performing an activity or business
processsuch as creating a customer invoice
The costs of serving a customer
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Management accounting also produces measures
of the economic performance of decentralized
operating units, such as:
Business units
Divisions
Departments
These measures help senior managers assess the
performance of the companys decentralized units
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Management accounting information is a key
source of information for decision making,
improvement, and control in organizations
Effective management accounting systems can
create considerable value to todays organizations
by providing timely and accurate information
about the activities required for their success
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Traditionally, management accounting
information has been financial information
Denominated in a currency such as $ (dollars),
(pound sterling), (yen), or (euro)
Management accounting information has now
expanded to encompass information that is
operational or physical (nonfinancial) information:
Quality and process times
More subjective measurements, such as:
Customer satisfaction
Employee capabilities
New product performance
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Financial Accounting
Communicates economic
information to individuals
and organizations that are
external to the direct
operations of the company
Stresses the form in which
it is communicated
Is based on historical
information
Management Accounting
Provides information to
managers and employees
within the organization
Allows great discretion to
design systems that
provide information for
helping employees and
managers make decisions
Forward looking
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Financial information pervades our economy
It is the primary means of communication between
profit seeking organizations and their stakeholders
For this reason organizations use financial
measures internally as a broad indicator of
performance
This financial information provides a signal that
something is wrong, but not what is wrong
Financial information summarizes underlying
activities
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Developed by quality expert, W. Edwards Deming
A systematic and recursive way to develop,
implement, evaluate, and change a course of
action
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Plan Step defines the organizations purpose and
selects the focus and scope of its strategy
Do Step involves the implementation of a chosen
course of action
Check Step includes measuring and monitoring
performance and taking short-term actions based
on measured performance
Action Step involves managers taking actions to
lower costs, change resource allocations, and
improve quality
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As measurements are made on operations and
especially on individuals and groups their
behavior changes
People react when they are being measured, and
they react to the measurements
They focus on the variables and behavior being
measured and spend less attention on those not
measured
Two old sayings recognize these phenomena:
What gets measured gets managed.
If I cant measure it, I cant manage it.
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Employees familiar with the current system may
resist as managers attempt to introduce or redesign
cost and performance measurement systems
Employees have acquired expertise in the use of
the old system
Employees also may feel committed to the
decisions based on the information the old system
produced
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Management accountants must understand and
anticipate the reactions of individuals to
information and measurements
When the measurements are used not only for
information, planning, and decision-making, but
also for control, evaluation, and reward,
employees and managers place great pressure on
the measurements themselves
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Managers and employees may take unexpected
and undesirable actions to influence their score on
the performance measure
Managers seeking to improve current bonuses
based on reported profits may skip discretionary
expenditures that may improve performance in
future periods
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Management accounting has become an exciting
discipline that is undergoing major changes to
reflect the challenging new environment that
organizations worldwide now face
Need to develop financial and nonfinancial
information that will:
Focus on aggregate, usually financial, measures of
performance in for-profit organizations that provide
an overall summary of performance, and the ability
of the organization to meet its financial objectives
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Focus on the organizations success in meeting its
customers requirements in for-profit organizations
so that the organization can react promptly to
failures in delivering the value proposition
Enable all organizations to identify process
improvements needed to improve the
organizations ability to deliver its value
proposition
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Enable all organizations to identify the potential of
the organizations members to manage and
improve process performance
Enable the for-profit organization to assess the
profitability and desirability of continued
investment in various entities such as products,
product lines, departments, and organization units
Enable the organization to motivate, monitor, and
detect noncompliance with inappropriate
organization behavior
2012 Pearson Prentice Hall. All rights reserved.
2012 Pearson Prentice Hall. All rights reserved.
