The effect of competitive strategy, task uncertainty and organisation structure on the usefulness and performance of management accounting system (MAS)

Abstract

The purpose of this study takes a view of the responsibility center to examine the effect of competitive strategy, organisational structure and task uncertainty on the usefulness of management accounting system (MAS) information and MAS performance. The research sample includes 138 production departments in Taiwan. The major findings of this study are: 1) There is a significant relation between competitive strategy and the usefulness of MAS information; besides, there is also a significant positive relationship between the usefulness of MAS information and MAS performance. 2) When manufacturing departments adopt differentiation strategy, they face higher task uncertainty that would takes shape of decentralisation organisation structure; moreover, there is also a positive relationship between decentralisation and the usefulness of MAS information.