The role of manufacturing practices in mediating the impact of activity-based costing on plant performance

We study the impact of activity-based costing (ABC) on adoption of world-class manufacturing (WCM) practices and plant performance. In contrast to earlier research that estimates the direct impact of ABC on plant performance, we develop an alternative research model to study the role of world-class manufacturing practices as a mediator of the impact of ABC. Analysis of data from a large cross-sectional sample of US manufacturing plants indicates that ABC has no significant direct impact on plant performance, as measured by improvements in unit manufacturing costs, cycle time, and product quality. We find, however, that WCM practices completely mediate the positive impact of ABC on plant performance, and thus advanced manufacturing capabilities represent a critical missing link in understanding the overall impact of ABC. Our results provide a different conceptual lens to evaluate the relationship between ABC adoption and plant performance, and suggest that ABC adoption by itself does not improve plant performance.     

Management accounting and control practices in a lean manufacturing environment

A lean strategy is rapidly becoming the dominant paradigm in manufacturing. Kennedy and Widener (2008) use a case study to develop a theoretical framework of management accounting and control practices for firms following a lean manufacturing strategy. We build on Kennedy and Widener (2008) by examining a structural equation model that provides evidence on the extent to which a lean manufacturing implementation is related to five management accounting and control practices. Using survey data from 244 US companies with an interest in lean manufacturing, we find a direct positive relation between the extent of a lean manufacturing implementation and a simplified strategic reporting system, value stream costing, visual performance measurement information, and employee empowerment. We find a direct negative relation with inventory tracking; however, we find it is conditional on the extent of top management support for change in production strategies such that firms decrease reliance on inventory tracking in the presence of strong management support. We also conclude that the management accounting and control practices work together as a package in a lean manufacturing environment as evidenced by the many direct associations among the five management accounting and control practices.     

The Association Between Activity-Based Costing and Manufacturing Performance

This study examines the association between activity-based costing and manufacturing performance. Results using a cross-sectional sample of manufacturing plants indicates that extensive ABC use is associated with higher quality levels and greater improvements in cycle time and quality, and is indirectly associated with manufacturing cost reductions through quality and cycle time improvements. However, on average, extensive ABC use has no significant association with return on assets. Instead, we find weak evidence that the association between ABC and accounting profitability is contingent on the plant's operational characteristics.     

Enacting a European supply chain: a case study on the role of management accounting

This study reports on an action research project carried out in two non-Japanese, U.K. manufacturing companies that were considering the establishment of a strategic supply partnership. In the assembler company, materials constituted 80% of manufacturing costs with the result that managing supply chain costs has become a most critical element in overall cost control. The company was seeking closer ties involving information sharing and R&D collaboration with suppliers of strategic components. On its part, the supplier wished to move towards the level of co-operation and trust that the two companies had realized in their U.S. operations. The participation of the researchers as neutral intermediaries between the two companies gave them an opportunity to analyse the role of management accounting in the construction of a strategic partnership. The constitutional role of accounting is highlighted together with the need to develop costing and performance measurement technologies that can be understood and respected by both senior managers and non-accountants involved in the procurement process.     

FROM THE UNION HALL: A LABOR CRITIQUE OF THE NEW MANUFACTURING AND ACCOUNTING REGIMES

This study presents the critique of new manufacturing regimes that is emerging out of debates within the U.S. labor movement over the merits of union/management cooperation as a strategy for revitalizing American manufacture. The research focuses on the labor histories of three union locals in Decatur, Illinois and their critique of new forms of factory governance such as teams, quality circles and employee participation programs. The paper examines the implications of the labor critique for management accounting's attempt to establish its relevance within contemporary manufacturing environments.Introduction A new conventional wisdom has found its way into management accounting theory and practice. Accounting academics, industry consultants, the media, trade journals and accounting textbooks now almost uniformly accept that traditional cost accounting, with its emphasis on controlling production workers, is no longer relevant to contemporary management and manufacturing strategies (Johnson @2e Kaplan, 1987). Consequently, traditional cost accounting is being re-thought, revised and revolutionized (Johnson, 1992; Shank @2e Govindarajan, 1993).     

Assessing the interaction effect of cost control systems and information technology integration on manufacturing plant financial performance

The interface between management control and information technology is an under-developed research area with a knowledge gap concerning its implications for financial performance. This study contributes to bridging this gap by investigating the interaction effect of cost control systems and information technology integration on manufacturing plant financial performance. We surveyed a sample of 518 managers of U.S. manufacturing plants, approximately evenly distributed between those using activity-based costing and volume-based costing. Using hierarchical regression analyses, results indicate that while information technology integration and cost control systems do not provide significant independent effects on plant financial performance, they do interact to positively impact manufacturing plant financial performance. Thus, our findings suggest that manufacturing plants will reap the greatest financial performance benefits from investments in activity-based cost control systems when combined with information technology integration.     

论我国政府财务会计信息质量特征

政府财务会计作为政府会计的重要组成部分,其职能主要是对外提供满足各利益相关者进行决策所需的会计信息,从而解除政府的受托责任。作为对外会计,其所提供的产品即会计信息必须严格遵循相关准则制度的要求,并符合相应的质量标准。本文认为政府财务会计信息质量特征具有多维性,首先受成本收益的约束,只有在成本小于收益的前提下提供会计信息才是可行的,提供的所有信息从总体上要求具有可理解性,在内容上要满足可靠性和相关性,在会计信息的口径和方法上应遵循可比性,同时应保持一定程度的谨慎性,而在信息的取舍上主要取决于重要性特征。     

Enhanced ABC costing for hospitals: directed expense costing

Space limitations do not allow a complete discussion of all the topics and many of the obvious questions that the preceding brief introduction to directed expense costing probably raised in the reader's mind. These include how errors in accounting practices like posting expenses to the wrong period are handled; and how the system automatically adjusts costs for expenses benefiting several periods but posted to the acquisition month. As was mentioned above, underlying this overtly simple costing method are a number of sophisticated and sometimes complex processes that are hidden from the normal user and designed to automatically protect the integrity and accuracy of the costing process. From a user's viewpoint, the system is straightforward, understandable, and easy to use and audit. From a software development perspective, it is not quite that effortless. By using a system that is understood by all users at all levels, these users can now communicate with each other in a new and effective way. This new communication channel only occurs after each user is satisfied as to the overall costing quality achieved by the process. However, not all managers or physicians are always happy that the institution is using this "understandable" cost accounting system. During one of the weekly meetings of a hospital's administrative council, complaints from several powerful department heads concerning the impact that the use of cost data was having on them were brought up for discussion. In defending the continued use of the system, one vice president stated to the group that cost accounting does not get any easier than this, or any less expensive, or any more accurate. The directed expense process works and works very well. Our department heads and physicians will have to come to grips with the accountably it provides us to assess their value to the hospital.     

Extractive industries accounting and economic consequences: Past,present and future

Accounting for the extractive industries has been a contested issue for decades as a result of a choice of different methods of costing available and the economic impacts of these methods on companies’ financial results. When the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) embarked on its extractive industries project in 1998, it attempted to create uniform accounting practices. An archival study of constituent responses to the IASB's Issues Paper revealed that the economic consequences argument was relied upon again to argue for retaining choice. The IASB's international accounting standard, IFRS 6, issued in 2004, once again permitted choice between methods, illustrating the effectiveness of the economic consequences argument in perpetuating past practice.     

The social scientific turn in UK financial accounting research: A philosophical and sociological analysis

The demise of the classical programme of financial accounting research is generally represented as a progressive development. This paper argues that the academy's abandonment of classical methods was justified neither by the fruitfulness of post‐classical programmes nor by their incontestable epistemological superiority. Rather, what occurred was a turn to mainstream social science, reflecting sociological characteristics of the UK financial accounting research community. The paper concludes with a call for a revival of the classical programme.     

Parallels between US and UK cost accountancy in the World War I era

Both the US and UK governments attempted desperate measures during World War I in an effort to maintain wartime production levels of necessary commodities and to allow for their economical purchase by the military. Loft (1986a, 1986b, 1990) has studied the British experience in depth, concluding that UK cost accountancy 'came into the light' as a result. It might be expected that similar developments would have occurred in America with the activities of the War Industries Board. In both countries, national associations were established in the immediate aftermath of the war to promote the professional standing of cost accountants. This paper utilizes archival materials in an effort to investigate whether US cost accountancy was developing more sophisticated costing techniques as Loft has claimed for the UK, or whether practitioners in this country were left 'still cursing the darkness'. Our findings suggest that cost accountancy developed in parallel fashion in both countries. US and UK cost accounting professionalism was dominated by the presence of leading financial accounting practitioners, and in both countries the movement towards more sophisticated costing techniques was gradual rather than dramatic.     

Management accounting and the challenge of strategic focus

The paper presents a case study of management accounting in a company that had been a highly diversified conglomerate but was implementing a new strategy of product market focus combined with a more multinational scope. Formerly subject to a simple but rigorous form of financial control, the new organizational identity of becoming a high-growth, high-technology company posed fresh challenges for its control style and, in particular, for the role of management accounting. The paper draws on self-referential systems theory in order to analyse the paradox that while an organization can become more focused on particular markets and technologies, its management accounting seems to become more diffuse and differentiated. As the company sought to develop a different corporate epistemology through the reproduction of a fresh identity, it established new forms of corporate communication through its quality and performance management systems. Autopoietic theory would acknowledge that management accounting should provide some system guidance but would warn against the possible danger that some forms of performance control may damage company self-production.     

Hospital Costing: Experience from the VHA

The government administered Veterans Health Administration (VHA) is the largest integrated health care system in the USA. As health care dollars are becoming tighter nationwide, VHA faces the dual challenge of achieving cost reductions and improving quality, while operating in an increasingly competitive marketplace. This places new demands on cost accountability within the agency. This paper identifies the cost accounting procedures currently used by VHA as it responds to internal budgetary curtailment and to external competitive pressures. Understanding the different costing approaches taken by the organization along with their associated problems offers lessons of interest to financial managers within and outside VHA.     

The role of performance measures and incentive systems in relation to the degree of JIT implementation

The shift to world-class manufacturing strategies has necessitated complementary changes in management accounting systems (MAS). Using survey data obtained from top manufacturing executives at 253 US firms, this study empirically examines the relationship between the level of just-in-time (JIT) practices implemented by US manufacturing firms and the performance measures and incentive systems that are incorporated in their MAS. The statistical tests provide empirical evidence that the use of non-traditional performance measures such as bottom-up measures, product quality, and vendor quality, as well as incentive systems of employee empowerment and compensation rewards for quality production are related to the degree of JIT practices implemented.     

Debate: Society,socialism, sociology

This article investigates the implementation of benchmarking in three large acute NHS trusts. The findings concentrate on the attitudes of professional groups towards the preparation and use of management accounting information for performance measurement and comparison in NHS trusts. The problems revealed in developing appropriate costing information in this organizational context suggest difficulties lie ahead as more far-reaching organizational and financial change permeates the NHS.     

Responsibility cost control system in China: a case of management accounting application

This paper introduces the responsibility cost control system installed at Han Dan Iron and Steel Company in the People’s Republic of China. The Company has adopted a series of management accounting techniques or procedures in its cost control system, including target costing, responsibility accounting, standard costing, flexible budgeting, internal transfer pricing, behavior motivation, performance evaluation, variance analysis, and so on. In particular, the system has integrated responsibility accounting and cost control by introducing market mechanisms to substantially reduce production costs and raise profitability. The successful experiment reveals that the responsibility cost control system is an effective tool for cost control under the changing Chinese business environment. The Han Dan experience demonstrates that management accounting can play a positive role in improving business management and profitability in China or other developing countries. In addition, this study casts light on effective diffusion of management accounting practices under different social and economic systems.     

Solving an international corporation’s travel dilemma

This instructional case, using the New Hampshire subsidiary of a London-based company, examines a financial reporting manager’s actual role in minimizing corporate travel expense and the related record keeping necessary to ensure ISO 14001 compliance. Students must use both quantitative and non-quantitative data to evaluate several alternatives while considering corporate policy ramifications of their ‘accounting’ decision. This case is designed primarily for the introductory managerial accounting course; and if used early in the semester, will reinforce course vocabulary. In addition, the case can be used later in the semester to provide a realistic application illustrating relevant costing and decision-making.     

Full costing versus variable costing: Does the choice still matter? An empirical exploration of UK manufacturing companies 1988–2002

This paper explores the impact of the choice of full costing, as a basis for stock valuation (SSAP 9), on the reported profitability of UK manufacturing companies from 1988–2002. It does so by assessing the sensitivity of these companies' profits to the adoption of the variable costing alternative and so explores the potential for this accounting method choice to influence this important performance measure. Tests are undertaken to identify the accounting significance of the stock asset and the stock adjustment, the longer term effects of the choice on the time series of companies' profits and the shorter term effects as reflected in variation in the annual profit signal (particularly, profit vs loss and profit growth vs profit decline). The results indicate that stock remains a substantial variable in profit measurement and that there are likely to be a minority of companies whose reported profitability during the period changes significantly depending upon the basis of stock valuation used. Given the absence of any definitive case for full costing over variable costing, these findings suggest that further research and some consideration of the modification of the existing standard to permit financial statement users to ascertain variable costing based profits are merited.     

A survey of factors influencing the choice of product costing systems in UK organizations

This paper reports on the findings of a postal questionnaire that examines the extent to which potential contextual factors influence the characteristics of product costing systems. Prior research has mostly used the adoption or non-adoption of ABC systems to capture the characteristics of product costing systems. This research has generally been inconclusive and has been unable to establish strong links between ABC adoption and those contextual factors that have been identified in the literature that are conducive to the adoption of ABC systems. Instead of using only the adoption or non-adoption of ABC systems as a measure of product cost system design this research uses four different proxy measures of cost system sophistication to capture the characteristics of the product costing systems. This allows for a more robust test of the relations among the predictor variables and cost system sophistication. Results indicate that higher levels of cost system sophistication are positively associated with the importance of cost information, extent of use of other innovative management accounting techniques, intensity of the competitive environment, size, extent of the use of JIT/lean production techniques and the type of business sector. No association was found between the level of cost system sophistication and cost structure, product diversity and quality of information technology.