INTRODUCTION Since 1980s the world has seen the nature of doing business has changed tremendously.

With the latest trend of doing business and product innovation, top management has to be involved more actively in ensuring the organization achieved its specified goals. To achieve those objectives, management has to rely heavily on useful managerial accounting information to help them in planning, making decisions and controlling resources for producing goods or services to their clients. According to Garrison and Noreen (1999) managerial accounting is concerned with providing information to managers that is, to those who are inside an organization and who direct and control its operations. The Institute of Management Accountants, management accounting is 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. Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA) defined management accounting as the process of identification, measurement, accumulation, analysis, preparation, interpretation and communication of information used by management to plan, evaluate and control the entity and to assure appropriate use of and accountability for its resource. The demand for managerial accounting has increased dramatically as the nature of the business evolving. A study conducted by Tayles, Pike, & Sofian (2007), they have found that firms need to invest heavily in intellectual capital (IC) in the evolution of its management accounting practices. This shows that management accounting practices is important for the firm to perform. The list of management accounting practices mentioned in this study are reporting & decisions, performance measurement, budgetary control and capital investment. Before we go further in the exploring managerial accounting functions, let us look at the primary difference between the usage of financial and managerial accounting information. Financial accounting provide information to external parties such as stockholders, bankers, creditors and investors to make economic decision, whereas managerial accounting provide information to internal parties to make various decisions pertaining companys operations. Managerial accounting is part of organizations management information system and one of its functions is to provide internal financial information to managers. Managerial accounting emphasizes the future while financial accounting emphasis on the past.

LITERATURE REVIEW Since the mid-1980s the Management Accountant has been subjected to major criticism concerning its relevance to the information needs of managers. As organizations and their environments become increasingly complex, management accountants face growing difficulties in ensuring that the accounting processes, methods and techniques can cope with the pressures for change (William D Murphy).

In the past, managerial accountants were primarily engaged in cost accounting collecting and reporting costs to management, but for the last two decades have witnessed a re-evaluation of management accounting (MA), in terms of developing new techniques and systems (Scapens, 1990; Abdul Khalid, 2000) and also changes in the roles of management accountants (Evans et al., 1996; Burns and Yazdifar, 2001; Scapens et al., 2003). The development of management accounting activity has gone through four (4) evolutionary phases. Management Accounting Concept published in the Malaysian Institute of Accountants website stated management accounting activity has developed through four recognizable stages: Stage 1 prior to 1950, the focus was on cost determination and financial control, through the use of budgeting and cost accounting technologies; Stage 2 by 1965, the focus had shifted to the provision of information for management planning and control, through the use of such technologies as decision analysis and responsibility accounting; Stage 3 by 1985, attention was focused on the reduction of waste in resources used in business processes, through the use of process analysis and cost management technologies Stage 4 by 1995, attention had shifted to the generation or creation of value through the effective use of resources, through the use of technologies which examine the drivers of customer value, shareholder value and organizational innovation.

While these four stages are recognizable, the process of change from one to another has been evolutionary. The diagram below illustrates the evolution of management accounting activity which will to continue to evolve in the future.

History has shown that changes in business will continue to shape the nature of management accounting. Robles and Robles (2004:14) identified 1999 as a crucial year during which management accounts yet again had to adapt themselves and their practices to supply appropriate information for decision making purposes. Management accounting change has been widely used as an expression of this shift (see, for example, Burns and Vaivio, 2001), encompassing two types of development: the adoption of new tools and techniques which potentially enhance accounting practice, on the one hand, and, on the other, change in the role that the accountant performs, towards acting more in an advisory capacity integral to managerial decision-making rather than solely as a provider of information. International Federation of Accountants stated, management accounting, as an integral part of the management process which is focused on organizational resources use effectively by organizations in creating value for shareholders, customers or other stakeholders. In this regards, resources include not only those in financial form, but also resources created and used by organizations as a result of financial expenditure. Philip Cooper and Eleanor Dart (2009) stressed many writers point to the work of Johnson and Kaplan (1987) as seminal in this respect there has been a paradigmatic shift in the expectations of the management accountant. Consequently their role has changed significantly; as a result, managerial accountants now serve as team members alongside personnel from production, marketing, and engineering when the company makes critical strategic decision (Weygandt, Kimmel & Kieso, 2010). Siegel (2000) mentioned that adding value means helping managers run the business. It means managerial accountant provide managers with relevant information for business decisions, explaining how the information impacts the decision, and participating in the decision-making process.