Discussion: Trends in Management Accounting-MOD 4

Responses

Daniel Parsons

In Gary Cokins video describing the seventh trend, behavioral change management, he highlights some of the importance that needs placed on the process of incorporating change in an organization.  He discusses the fact people are naturally resistant to change and this can present a challenge in any organization to include the business and accounting world.  It is discussed how technology is often not the setback to innovation, but more often the human element.  I feel behavioral change management is an important element in virtually any organization.  In the military, we are taught the importance of being able to be flexible and adaptable in the performance of our mission.  Even with this being said, when the time and opportunity allow, such as in the instance of an overarching policy change or procedural change, there is value in behavioral change management.  When the opportunity allows for leadership to be able to identify the problem to the masses and address the necessary changes, this helps solicit buy-in from the members affected and can lead to a sense of their ownership over the change.  Granted not all situations in the military allow for this member-involved process of change, however for those that do, there is value in capitalizing on behavioral change management.  These 7 emerging trends in management accounting offer valuable insight from an individual who has been a professional in the field for years.  I found some more interesting and personally relevant than others, but overall, they each offered their own unique insight to what one can expect to see in today’s world of business and management accounting.

Whitney Reynolds

Class,

            In the final iteration of the IMA video series discussion, Trend 6 presented a topic that we previously ascended within our module 3 SLP assignment; chargebacks.  Internal chargebacks are a cost recovery tactic that delineates segments within an organization by way of the quantity of a particular resource utilized; seeking to recoup costs based on said usage percentage in comparison to adjacent segments (Whittle, 2019)

            Cokins states that most organizations do not treat a chargeback scenario as such; characterizing costs of this manner as overhead or indirect expenses (Institute of Management Accountants, 2014).  While not productively applicable to all industries, the shared services philosophy delineates activity based costing and allows leaders to make sound analytical decisions based on usage, demand, and the internal cause and effect relationship; eliminating the “free services” mentality (Institute of Management Accountants, 2014).

            While in my current profession as a Marine Officer a correlative example of this principle is rather infrequent.  A stretch would be the manner in which a unit or organization uses their travel budget.  Good leaders want to ensure that they are providing their Marines with proper training opportunities weather that be courses/schools, or tactical events.  To travel to these locations obviously requires funding which is often taken for granted as alluded to by Cokins.  Smaller units in the Marine Corps do not have financial service personnel organic to the organization so more often than not there is no management of these funds and as a result, Marines at the later portion of the fiscal year are not afforded the opportunity to travel as funds have been execution poorly.

 The collective group of IMA videos have provided us a myriad of tools within the scope of managerial accounting principles that we can assuredly apply to a vast number of situations in both a personal and professional realm.