Management Accounting in the 21st Century: A Profession for which the Time Has Come

By Garry Marchant

The 21st Century has seen the emergence of the information age and the resulting economy driven by knowledge as a source of competitive advantage.

Critically the most significant change occurring in the information age is the dramatically changing nature of competition with the blurring of traditional industry boundaries and the emergence of whole new sectors.  The drivers of this fundamental shift in economic activity are leading to a new wave of innovation in management accounting and a new level of demand for the skills and capabilities of today’s professional management accountant.

Management accountants will increasingly find themselves as core members of the strategic team using their skills and capabilities in information management and analytics to develop and maintain the distinctive capabilities of their organisations.  Survival will be to those with the best analytical capabilities.

ARTICLES

The Impact of Management Accounting Systems on International Markets: Theory and Evidence Using the Balanced Scorecard Approach

By Laura Márquez-Ramos, José Antonio Aparisi-Caudeli

Information from the Port Authorities that make up the Spanish Port System before and after the implementation of the Balanced Scorecard has been used to analyse whether changes in management accounting play a role in international markets by means of analysing their effect on regional competitiveness.

This study makes three contributions to the literature. First, it is of great interest for the Spanish economy as a whole, due to the special importance of shipping as a way to access the main international markets. Second, it provides an unprecedented framework to relate research on management accounting with literature on international trade issues.

Finally, unlike previous studies, information on Annual Reports is used, allowing the comparison of performance measures over time in different organisational units.

Main results show that the improvement of the strategic and operational effectiveness of the Port Authorities has increased the competitiveness of Spanish regions.

Toward Understanding the Complexities of Service Costing: A Review of Theory and Practice

By Bülend Terzioglu, Elsie S. K. Chan

The purpose of this paper is to outline the issues and challenges inherent in service costing, and thus to add to the limited body of knowledge in this field. Through a review of the extant literature, key service costing issues are identified and discussed. Despite the importance of the service sector as reflected in its growing contribution to the gross domestic product of many developed nations worldwide, this study demonstrates that the long-standing problems associated with service costing appear to remain unfathomed and unresolved.

This study may provide a better understanding of the challenges associated with service costing for both practising management accountants and members of academia. Deficiencies in the literature are pinpointed. This paper represents the first attempt to synthesise the currently fragmented literature on service costing, and as such, it is hoped that it will provide a platform for researchers wishing to undertake further research in service costing.

Corporate Governance and Voluntary Disclosure Practices of Financial and Non-Financial Sector Companies in Bangladesh

By Anup Kumar Saha, Shahnag Akter

This paper examines the relationship between voluntary disclosure and several attributes of corporate governance using data from the annual reports of companies listed on the Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE) in 2011. The results obtained show statistically significant differences in levels of voluntary disclosure among listed companies in Bangladesh and show that companies in the financial sector disclose more voluntary information than non-financial companies.

Findings from this analysis indicate a negative association between voluntary disclosure and percentage of equity owned by insiders. By contrast, firm size and profitability show significant positive relationship with voluntary disclosure.

However, this study also shows that voluntary disclosure has no significant relationship with the percentage of equity held by institutions, board size, board audit committee and percentage of independent directors on the board of directors.

Testing the Rational Decision-Making Model through an Outsourcing Task

By Gregory Laing

Previous research on financial decision-making situations indicated that contextual aspects of financial information, such as framing, problem space and asset specificity influence the outcome. To assess the influence of these factors, an outsourcing task was used to survey the perceptions of accountants. The survey examined the effect of framing (positive/negative) with the inclusion of sunk and opportunity cost information across the decision task.

The respondents were also presented with information regarding asset specificity – the extent to which assets are inexorably tied to the specific project or outsourcing agreement. In making the decision to outsource, the sunk cost effect, framing and asset specificity were found to be significant factors in influencing the decision outcome.

The results however, were not fully consistent with the predictions of prospect theory in particular a reverse effect was found― in the negative frame, greater risk-avoidance was evident while in the positive frame, greater risk-taking was evident.