Managerial accounting

Accountants share with many others in an organization—such as financial officers or strategic planners—the task of analyzing cost and profit data in order to provide guidance in managerial decision making. Even if the analytical work is done largely by others, accountants must understand the analytical methods because the systems they design must collect data in forms suitable for analysis.

Managerial decisions are based on comparisons of the estimated future results of the alternative courses of action. Recorded historical accounting data, in contrast, reflect conditions and actions of the past. Furthermore, the data are absolute, not comparative, in that they show the effects of one course of action but do not indicate whether these were better or worse than those that would have resulted from some other course.

For decision making, therefore, historical accounting data must be examined, modified, and placed on a comparative basis. Even estimated data, such as budgets and standard costs, must be examined to see whether the estimates are still valid and relevant to managerial comparisons. To a large extent, this job of review and restatement is an accounting responsibility. Accordingly, a major part of the accountant’s preparation for the profession is devoted to the study of methods and principles of analysis that are used in managerial decision making.

Once the budgetary plan has been adopted, the accounting department’s next task is to prepare and provide to management information on the results of company activities. A manager’s main interest in this information centres on three questions: Have his or her own actions led to the expected results—and, if not, why not? How successfully have subordinates managed the activities entrusted to them? What problems and opportunities have arisen since the budgetary plan was prepared? For these purposes, the information must be comparative, relating actual results to the level of results that management regards as satisfactory. In each case, the standard for comparison is provided by the budgetary plan.

Much of this information is contained in periodic financial reports. At the top management and divisional levels, the most important of these is the comparative income statement, one of which is illustrated in Table 4. This shows the profit that was planned for this period, the actual results received for this period, and the differences, or variances, between the two. It also gives an explanation of some of the reasons for the difference between a planned and an actual income.

The report in this exhibit employs the widely used profit contribution format, in which divisional results reflect sales and expenses traceable to the individual divisions, with no deduction for head office expenses. Company net income is then obtained by deducting head office expenses as a lump sum from the total of the divisional profit contributions. A similar format can be used within the division, reporting the profit contribution of each of the division’s product lines, with the divisional headquarters’ expenses deducted at the bottom.

By far the greatest number of reports, however, are cost or sales reports, mostly on a departmental basis. Departmental sales reports usually compare actual sales with the volumes planned for the period. Departmental cost performance reports, in contrast, typically compare actual costs incurred with standards or budgets that have been adjusted to correspond to the actual volume of work done during the period. This practice reflects a recognition that volume fluctuations generally originate outside the department and that the department head’s responsibility is ordinarily limited to minimizing costs while meeting the delivery schedules imposed by higher management.

For example, a factory department’s output consists entirely of a single product, with a standard materials cost of $3 a unit and a standard labour cost of $16. Materials cost represents three pounds of raw materials at $1 a pound; standard labour cost is two hours of labour at $8 an hour. Overhead costs in the department are budgeted at $10,000 a month plus $2 a unit. Under normal conditions, volume is 7,000 units a month, but during October only 6,000 units were produced. The cost standards for the month would be as follows:

The actual cost this month was $17,850 for materials (17,000 pounds at $1.05), $101,250 for labour (12,500 hours at $8.10 an hour), and $23,000 for overhead. A summary report would show the following:

These variances may be analyzed even further in order to identify the underlying causes. The labour variance, for example, can be seen to be the result of both high wage rates ($8.10 instead of $8) and high labour usage (12,500 hours instead of 12,000). The factory accountant ordinarily would measure the effect of the rate change in the following way:

In most cases, the labour rate variance would not be reported to the department head, because it is not subject to his or her control.

Significant changes in management and production technology have shifted the focus of cost control from the individual production department to larger, more interdependent groups. Standard cost systems have largely been replaced by just-in-time production systems; although just-in-time systems require changes in factory layouts, they significantly reduce the time it takes to move work from one station to the next, and they also reduce the number of partly processed units at each work station, thereby requiring greater station-to-station coordination. All these measures increase the efficiency of production.

At the same time, management’s emphasis has shifted from cost control to cost reduction, quality enhancement, and closer coordination of production and customer deliveries. Most large manufacturing companies and many service companies have launched programs of total quality control and continuous improvement, and many have replaced standard costs with a more flexible approach using prior period results as current performance standards. Management is also likely to focus on the amount of system waste by identifying and minimizing activities that contribute nothing to the value that customers place on the product.

Real-time technology, based on the coordinated data used to monitor results and indicate the need for adjustments, helps improve a company’s productivity. Advances in computer-based models have enabled companies to tie production schedules more closely to customer delivery schedules while increasing the rate of plant utilization. Some of these changes actually increase variances from standard costs in some departments but are undertaken because they benefit the company as a whole.

The overall result is that control systems are likely to focus in the first instance on operational controls (real-time signals to operating personnel that some immediate remedial action is required), with after-the-fact analysis of results focusing on aggregate comparisons with past performance and the planned results of current improvement programs.