Proposed Topics for an Advanced Course in Managerial Accounting That Has a Strategic Focus and Deals Effectively in a Highly Fragmented, Highly Dynamic and Fiercely Competitive Buyer's Market

Abstract

The only text with the title “Advanced Managerial Accounting” and still available was last revised in 1998, and its first edition was 1982. The economic environment in the past 20 years has changed radically. To help prepare managerial accounting students to analyze and solve business problems they will face today, they need advanced managerial accounting course material that analyzes current issues using appropriate techniques and relevant information. Techniques and information relevant to yesterday’s highly stable sellers’ market cannot be used effectively in today’s highly fragmented, dynamic and competitive buyers’ market. This paper first suggests that the topics selected for an advanced managerial course should have a unifying strategic focus and be able to deal effectively in a highly fragmented, highly dynamic and fiercely competitive buyers’ market. Topics discussed that effectively analyze current economic issues are: Porter’s Strategy, Value Chain Analysis, BSC, ABC, ABM, Benchmarking, Quality- and Time-based Competition, Target Costing, CAM-I Capacity Model, Life Cycle Costing, Strategic Cost Management, Beyond Budgeting Model, Measuring Innovation, Environmental Costing, and a Process-focused Organizational Structure. Lastly, it suggests a process to identify relevant, advanced managerial accounting course topics, select highly qualified authors to write the appropriate educational materials, and finally, make the materials available to students electronically. A questionnaire was sent to 142 accounting department chairs to determine how popular the advanced managerial accounting course is in their programs and to request that the syllabus for the course be supplied. Fifty-one questionnaires (36%) were returned; 37 schools (73%) responding listed an Advanced Managerial Accounting course in their course catalog; however, 6 of the 37 were not currently offering the course. Therefore, only 31 (61%) of the 51 schools responding are making the course available to their students. In the 31 schools that offer the course only nine (29%) require it. Twenty-six of the 31 currently offering the course supplied a syllabus. Instructors from six schools developed their own packet of case and reading materials, five instructors required Horngren, et al.’s Cost Accounting text. Other texts were adopted by three or fewer of the remaining 15 who supplied a syllabus. The 26 syllabi are an appendix to this paper.