Excel in the accounting curriculum: perceptions from accounting professors

Public accounting firms emphasize the importance of accounting graduates being proficient in Excel. Since many accounting graduates often aspire to work in public accounting, a question arises as to whether there should be an emphasis on Excel in accounting education. The purpose of this paper is to specifically look at this issue by examining accounting faculty's perceptions of Excel in public accounting and accounting education. We survey 245 faculty members at over 100 accounting programs. We find that a majority of faculty incorporate Excel in their accounting classes consistent with their perception of Excel importance. However, we find that students are not fully proficient in Excel based on faculty's perceptions. This study contributes to the accounting education literature by identifying possible disconnections between Excel skills faculty include in the accounting curriculum and specific Excel skills faculty believe new hires (i.e. recent accounting graduates) most often use in public accounting.     

诉讼会计在我国的发展与前景展望——兼论会计师事务所业务的新领域

1 诉讼会计的涵义及在西方国家的发展 诉讼会计(Forensic Accounting),也译为法务会计,是西方国家于二十世纪八十年代初,为适应市场经济的发展和法律制度的日趋完善而产生的一个会计新领域.它既不同于以往的一般会计工作,又异于一般的政府审计、独立审计及内部审计,是界于一般会计和审计之间、涉及司法领域的特殊会计工作,可以说,是一门新兴的边缘会计学科.     

Including audit regulation in the accounting curriculum

Audits and auditors are regulated to uphold audit quality, thus regulation is important to the public interest and clearly impacts firms and CPAs. Moreover, the reach of audit regulation has expanded greatly in the last decade with the establishment of the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB). Recent research and calls from the profession point to enhancing the coverage of audit regulation in the accounting curriculum so that students understand the consequences of failing to adhere to professional standards. In this paper, we propose regulatory content for inclusion in the curriculum, we survey and catalog existing auditing textbooks and other educational materials for regulatory content, and we suggest flexible alternatives for incorporating this topic into the curriculum. It is our hope that, with these resources, faculty can more effectively include audit regulation in the classroom and achieve a high level of student comprehension and learning on the topic.     

A factor analysis on knowledge and skill components of accounting education: Chinese case

Accounting education reform is being called upon by the profession and business communities in many countries under new business environment with high-tech production, economic globalization and intensified market competition. This study, by applying the factor analysis research method, has empirically-developed 6 latent constructs about the desirable knowledge and skill components that should be emphasized in accounting education in order to meet the challenges stemming from the changing business environment, i.e., business/management skills, business/management knowledge, core accounting knowledge, personal characteristics, general knowledge, and basic techniques. The structural order of, or the interrelationship among, these six dimensions of the knowledge and skill requirements in accounting education is also elaborated based on the analysis of factor loading results. The findings of this study should assist various groups of stakeholder (e.g., accounting practitioners, educators and students) to gain a better understanding of needed changes in accounting education and provide input for redesigning accounting curriculum to promote a smooth progress of accounting education reform in China and other countries.     

Integrating a CD-ROM database in the accounting curriculum

This paper presents a methodology for keeping students abreast of a new information technology by integrating the use of optical media for storage and distribution into the accounting curriculum. Two student projects are presented which build proficiency in locating and organizing data in a database and in using intellectual skills to analyze that data. The authors found that these projects made the course material more relevant and meaningful for both the students and the instructor.     

Integrating effective writing skills in the accounting curriculum

The J.M. Tull School of Accounting at the University of Georgia has developed a program for its accounting curriculum which integrates the teaching of effective writing skills with the regular accounting courses. Students in a three-course sequence write a total of eight papers — technical, memos, or reports. The assignments resemble on-the-job technical writing tasks actually encountered by professional accountants. A full-time writing consultant on the School's staff provides occasional lectures and handouts for students on effective writing skills; she also provides help to individual students who may need it. Papers are evaluated for both accounting content and effective writing     

The process of measurement in managerial accounting: A psycho-technical systems perspective

This paper develops a formal framework of the act or process of measurement in managerial accounting. Although the traditional paradigm of measurement underlying accounting treats it as a technology designed to represent properties of events and transactions in numerical terms, this paper is based on the notion that managerial accounting measurement is intended to facilitate behavior, and thus requires an alternative view of measurement as a “psycho-technical system”. The paper presents the psycho-technical framework and examines its application in selected areas of managerial accounting: human resource accounting, social accounting, divisional performance evaluation, zero-based budgeting, standard costing, and evaluation of internal control systems.     

The case for strategic management accounting: The role of accounting information for strategy in competitive markets

A review of two economic theories is utilized to provide theoretical support for the greater possible involvement by accountants in what has been called strategic management accounting. One of these theories is concerned with the underlying characteristics of enterprise products. It suggests that there is a need for accountants to consider the cost structure of not only their own firm but of all enterprises in the relevant market and of potential entrants. It also suggests that costs can not be considered in isolation from demand factors. The second theory to be reviewed is concerned with whether a firm's cost structure permits its market strategy to be sustainable in the face of potential entry. This theory again emphasizes the intertwining of demand and cost factors and the need to consider these factors simultaneously. The use of this theory allows a new perspective to be taken to cost behaviour which is especially suited to high technology manufacturing.     

会计师事务所品牌建设中的文化内涵——基于会计师事务所与一般企业的比较分析

会计师事务所的人合特征、社会责任和专业属性决定了其在品牌建设方面有着与一般企业不同的要求和内涵。会计师事务所品牌建设的核心是文化的建设,文化建设包括择善固执的诚信文化、戒慎恐惧的风险文化和执经达变的执业文化三个方面。作为一个市场主体,会计师事务所也需要进行品牌建设并在市场中推广,本文就以品牌建设和推广为导向的会计师事务所社会与企业属性中的文化内涵作一些分析,寻找具有会计师事务所特质的品牌建设与推广策略与方式。     

Learning in organisations: a corporate curriculum for the knowledge economy

This paper elaborates on the argument that the economy is transforming into a knowledge economy. Therefore, individuals, teams and companies need to develop the necessary competencies to be able to participate in a working life that is mainly based on knowledge productivity. The traditional approaches to management, training and development will not provide the learning environment that is required for knowledge work. Each company should consciously design a corporate curriculum that turns the day to day work environment into a learning environment. The knowledge economy may bring prosperity to those who join the new elite of knowledge workers. Inherently, it also creates new imbalances.     

Importing accounting: the case of Trinidad and Tobago

In the period immediately following its achieving independence, Trinidad and Tobago switched from a pattern of importing British professional accountants to one of importing British professional qualifications. It was also in this period that the first professional accounting association appeared: that is, eighty years after such bodies emerged in Britain and her settler colonies. This paper seeks to explain why the achievement of political independence in Trinidad and Tobago (and perhaps in some other British non-settler colonies) signified a critical turning point in the development of a local accounting profession. The paper also explores how the history of importing accounting impacted on the contemporary organization of the profession in Trinidad and Tobago.     

Management accounting practices in Europe: a perspective from the States

I provide a perspective from the States on four questions primarily based on information inManagement Accounting: European Perspectivesedited by Al Bhimani (1996). First, seven factors are identified as having shaped management accounting practices in European nations—academics, education, government, professional associations, consultants, technology, and the inter-nation transfer of information. Second, evidence supports the view that, across European nations, more changes are occurring in management accounting practice terminology and techniques than in the purposes and styles of using management accounting techniques. Third, evidence indicates that there is convergence across European nations in management accounting practices, especially in terminology and techniques, but less convergence in the purposes and styles of using techniques. Fourth, management accounting practices in European nations, particularly terminology and techniques, is converging on a global management accounting practice model. I propose that management accounting practices—particularly terminology and techniques—is converging across nations (at least for those firms that are affected by the global economy)anddiverging across industries both within and between nations.     

The dilemma of implementing controls: The case of managerial accounting

Managerial accounting contains a technical theory of control. Whenever this technical theory of control is correctly implemented to deal with issues that are embarrassing or threatening, the players activate their personal-human theory of control in order to remain “in control”. The correct implementation of the personal-human theory of control necessary inhibits the effective implementation of the technical theory and vice versa.     

The evolution of management accounting routines in small businesses: a social construction perspective

This paper explores the development of management accounting in small firms through a social construction perspective. Taking Dirsmith’s (1998) (Dirsmith, M. W. 1998. Accounting and control as a solution to technical problems, political exchanges and forms of social discourse: the importance of substantive domain, Behavioural Research in Accounting, 10 (Supplement), 65–77) lead we examine the evolution of control and decision-making processes within four growth-orientated service sector businesses. Key to the perspective is the notion of the owner–manager and his/her employees as creators of management accounting routines that form through a cycle of action, externalization and habitualization. These routines still remain in the control of the originator and are flexible in nature. As the business grows these routines may become objectified into localized management accounting ‘facts’ and they may also be challenged by externally imported accounting conventions. This paper explores the creation of idiosyncratic accounting knowledge and the effects of its transmission over the history of the businesses.     

The interplay between cost accounting knowledge and presentation formats in cost-based decision-making

Most studies on cost-based decision-making examine the profit impact of cost reports that rely on different methods to allocate costs. In practice, firms’ cost reports often employ the same cost allocation method with subtle variations in the way that the cost data are presented. This paper examines experimentally the profit impact of a cost report’s presentation format in relation to a decision maker’s level of cost accounting knowledge. Using a customer profitability report prepared using activity-based costing and presented in either a tabular or a graphical format, participants analyze a complex pricing and resource allocation task that affects firm profitability. The results suggest a strong relation between presentation format and cost accounting knowledge. Specifically, decision makers with a low level of cost accounting knowledge attain higher profits when they use a graphical format in comparison to a tabular format. More surprisingly, graphs (versus tables) have an adverse effect on profits for users with a high level of cost knowledge. This result has broad implications: in order to facilitate the decisions of a variety of users of accounting data (e.g. managers, external investors, etc.), firms may need to adapt the presentation format of their accounting data to the level of accounting sophistication of the users.     

The change on the foundations of the Turkish accounting system and the future perspective

Accounting is a social construct and shaped by the society in which it operates. Needs of society are the most important influencing factors in the development of accounting in a country. Though in today's open system societies, the change in the accounting is inevitable, it should not be forgotten that accounting is not only a practice but also a discipline which has got theoretical and historical backgrounds. In this regard, this paper notes the changes in Turkish accounting system from the theoretical and historical perspectives.     

Managerial accounting systems and organizational control: A role perspective

This paper proposes a new way of viewing the relationship between managerial accounting systems and organizational control. This is done to provide a structure around which control processes may be observed and research conducted. In the context of role theory several propositions are advanced in order to explain the relationship. Namely, it is noted that managerial accounting systems are useful in communicating role expectations, are important to motivation, and are useful in communicating organizational climate. Also, several factors concerning managerial style and social context were seen to influence the operativeness of these propositions.     

Pro-producer regulation and accounting for assets: The case of electric utilities

This paper's thesis is that rate-of-return regulation of the electric utility industry was a pro-producer regulatory policy, and that supra-competitive returns were earned by regulated utilities even while their accounting rate-of-returns met the ‘fair’ return constraint established by law. It is argued that this was accomplished by using the accounting system to revalue upward the asset bases of regulated utilities. The empirical results support this hypothesis in that utilities regulated by state commissions had abnormally high book values for their assets compared with unregulated utilities in 1917 and 1922.     

Inclusion, exclusion and control: The case of the Kenyan accounting professionalisation project

This study explores the concept of closure within professional projects and its application to the development of the accounting profession in Kenya, an ex-British colony. It draws on oral history techniques and archival research to examine the construction of the institutional arrangements for accountancy, from 1970 to 1978, within a political, social and historical context. Responding to calls for a more nuanced theorisation of Weberian closure [Chua, W., & Poullaos, C. (1993). Rethinking the profession-state dynamic: The Victorian chartered attempt. Accounting, Organisations and Society, 18(7/8), 691–782; Chua, W., & Poullaos, C. (1998). The dynamics of ‘closure’ amidst the construction of market, profession, empire and nationhood: An historical analysis of an Australian accounting association, 1886–1903. Accounting, Organisations and Society, 23(2), 155–187], the Kenyan case is used to illustrate that not all professionalisation projects are simply the pursuit of monopolistic control driven by collective social mobility. The inclusion of all qualified accountants rather than exclusion was, in this instance, vital in order to ensure that a viable association was formed amidst existing neo-colonial societal divisions along racial lines and the demands of the newly-formed State. The evidence presented shows how different strategies were adopted by different interest groups at different stages of the project.     

Using Pacioli’s pedagogy and medieval text in today’s introductory accounting course

Students today see little relevance in learning double-entry bookkeeping and find it difficult to learn how to prepare journal entries correctly. In particular, they struggle with the first stage of the double-entry process: identifying which accounts are to be debited and which are to be credited for each transaction. This paper reports on an attempt to overcome this situation by using the first printed instructional text on the subject (Pacioli, 1494) as the principal textbook on a 20-hour component of the introductory financial accounting course in an undergraduate accounting degree program. Instruction followed the pedagogy presented by Pacioli and only minimal additional costs to faculty were incurred.