Management accounting practices of SMEs: The impact of organizational DNA, business potential and operational technology

Abstract

Abstract Changes in global business environment have driven transformation in Small and Medium-size Enterprises (SMEs) to move toward sustainability by focusing on cost efficiency. Management accounting literature continues to suggest the benefits of adopting Management Accounting Practices (MAPs) in improving business sustainability. MAPs provide various tools, techniques and valuable internal information including for budgeting, profit planning and performance evaluation. MAPs are also shaped by management accounting information system. Variations in its application among businesses are common since the management accounting practices are not standardized. This study contributes to the existing gap in management accounting literature particularly from the view of a developing economy by examining the current stage of MAPs development and the impact of three factors (i.e., organizational DNA, business potential, and operational technology) on the MAPs in Malaysia. Since MAPs are organizational-specific, contingency theory was used in this study. A total of 310 questionnaires were sent to SMEs in the east coast of Malaysia and 110 were returned. However, 8 of them were incomplete and thus, excluded from the final analyses. The study suggests that these SMEs adopt the first 2 of the 4 stages of MAPs development based on Nishimura (2003) framework. Furthermore, the regression results show that only operational technology has a positive impact on the MAPs (p-value = 0.005). The other two variables (i.e., organizational DNA and business potential) do not significantly influence the MAPs. These findings are inconsistent with the results documented for large companies and thus, future studies are needed to further explore the MAP issues.