PREDICTORS OF EMPLOYEE PERFORMANCE IN PROFESSIONAL ACCOUNTING FIRMS

As the most important asset of a firm is its employees, it is useful to know the characteristics associated with successful job performance. This paper reports the result of an investigation which sought to examine the relationship between employee performance in professional accounting firms and a broad group of employee characteristics.     

ACCOUNTING FOR CONTRIBUTED SERVICES: AN IDENTIFICATION OF ISSUES*

The purpose of this paper is to identify the main issues of accounting for contributed services in not-for-profit organisations. The AICPA position on accounting for contributed services is reviewed. The findings of a survey of not-for-profit organisation's use of and accounting for the contributed services of voluntary workers are reported.     

ACCOUNTING FOR SEIGNIORAGE

This paper examines anomalies in the accounting procedures for the treatment of seigniorage on the Australian note and coin issue. It explains how the substitution of coins for notes leads to the unexpected result of reducing the budget deficit     

ACCOUNTING FOR INSECURITY

This paper argues that modern systems of budgetary control are implicated in the exploitation and production of insecure forms of employment. The flexibility of direct labour is assumed at a very basic level in some of the core techniques of costing and budgetary control. Previous historical studies of the development of these forms of control, moreover, have shown that they were used to shift the costs of economic fluctuation from capital to labour as well as to encourage the efficient utilisation of human effort. In the light of these observations, it is to be expected that the use of budgetary targets which incorporate direct labour costs will: (1) be more prevalent where the workers are least able to resist the various forms of “flexibility”; and (2) encourage recourse to redundancies where the performance of business units within a company falls below expectation. The paper then tests these hypotheses against data from a recent survey of industrial relations practice in large UK companies. The results show, firstly, that there is a strong and positive association between the proportions of females and part-timers within the workforce and the use of unit labour costs and the direct labour cost/sales ratio as performance targets. Secondly, the use of return-on-investment (R.O.I.) targets is associated with the declaration of redundancies in business units which have failed to perform satisfactorily. For those to whom insecurity of employment constitutes a social problem rather than a managerial convenience to be celebrated as “flexibility”, these findings indicate that the accounting control systems typical of the modern company constitute part of the problem. The achievement of the long-standing trade union aim of security of income and employment will depend, in part, on changing these systems of control.     

THE CORE OF THE CURRICULUM FOR ACCOUNTING UNDERGRADUATES - AN AUSTRALIAN STUDY*

This paper reports a study that adapted an American curriculum questionnaire to identify a common core of accounting knowledge from a list of 190 topics. Senior practitioners' and educators5 perceptions were surveyed to reach conclusions about the content of the common core and also the separate cores of accounting knowledge for the areas Financial Accounting, Managerial Accounting and Auditing.     

新企业会计准则系列——投资项目的分析方法一

近年来，一些上市公司利用长期投资进行资产交易获得高额投资收益仿佛已经成了习惯。一些不稳定的投资收益实际上是公司业绩的地雷，或许能支撑起公司暂时的繁荣，但却掩盖了公司经营与治理结构存在的问题，由此避免不了公司因投资收益剧减而业绩大滑坡的风险。因此，银行债权人应意识到，会计报表中的投资收益如果没有真实的业绩作背景，单凭利润表中的净利润说明不了任何问题。所以，本期我们将结合投资项目在会计报表中的披露，掌握投资项目对企业财务的影响。     

ACCOUNTING COURSES AND PROFESSIONAL FUNCTIONS*

In Australia, people performing accounting functions may have undertaken a course at a university, CAE, or technical college. This study is addressed to the rationale for this multiplicity of courses by seeking to determine whether there are different outcomes, such as professional functioning and salary, among graduates from these different courses. A specially devised questionnaire was developed to determine the degree of professionalism in late 1979 of accounting graduates from some Sydney and Melbourne universities, CAEs (UG1 bachelor degree and UG2 diploma courses), and technical colleges from the following years: 1970, 1974, 1976 and 1978. Limitations such as sample size prevent definitive answers. It was found that degree of professionalism and salary were related to attendance pattern, years of accounting experience before course completed, and years of accounting experience after course completed, but that the relationships with accounting course studied are low. Data counceming the mean percentage time spent on professional, technician, and other functions are provided.     

FIELD STUDIES IN THE ACCOUNTING CURRICULUM*

This paper describes the introduction and evaluation of a field study component in the management and cost accounting subjects of two undergraduate accounting courses. The three types of participants in the field studies — organizational contacts, College staff, and students — were surveyed using questionnaire (semantic differential) and telephone interview techniques, to ascertain attitudes toward the field study. Results of the survey demonstrated strong support for the studies from all three groups of participants, and several useful suggestions for improvement were received. From these results the field study concept seems to warrant further development and evaluation.     

ACCOUNTING FOR THE SEVERN BRIDGE

Although the Severn bridge has been financed as a vote-funded service, the Severn Bridge Tolls Act 1965 required the publication of commercial-style 'White Paper accounts'. The existence of this consistent source makes it possible to review the financial history to date of the Severn bridge, an interesting example of a case of government deciding that a capital-intensive infrastructural facility should break-even over its life. Two principal factors explain the everaccumulating deficiencies on the bridge account: the failure of successive governments to maintain the bridge toll in real terms; and the exceptional capital repairs required during the 1980s because of design faults and greater than expected loads. There are implications for the design of reporting systems for civil-service executive agencies and for the privatized 'concession'-style financing packages for transport infrastructure which the present Government has now adopted.     

新企业会计准则系列——新企业会计准则下的会计报表构成（一）

会计准则是规范企业会计确认、计量和报告行为,保证会计信息质量的会计法规,是会计人员在进行业务处职时的法律依据。     

VALUING AND ACCOUNTING FOR LOAN GUARANTEES

To achieve certain policy objectives, governments frequentlyprovide private borrowers with loan guarantees that cover someor all of the risk that the borrower will be unable to repaythe loan. Such guarantees are extremely valuable, and theirvalue increases with the riskiness of the underlying asset orcredit, the size of the investment, and the duration of theloan. The flip side of a guarantee's value to a lender is itscost to the government. Such a cost is not explicit but is realnevertheless. When providing guarantees, governments thereforemust establish accounting, valuation, and risk-sharing mechanisms.This article describes methods of valuing guarantees; reportsestimates of the value of guarantees in different settings;and summarizes new methods of accounting designed to anticipatelosses, create reserves, and channel funds through transparentaccounts to ensure that the costs of guarantees are evidentto government decisionmakers.