Techniques of Management Accounting

As a manager, do you know how to design a programming process that reinforces your organization's strategy? Are you familiar with the distinction between absorption costing and variable costing and the advantages and disadvantages of each? Do you know when to include depreciation in making an alternative choice decision and when not to? And, perhaps most important, do you know how that knowledge could help you -- and your organization -- to achieve breakthrough performance?

Techniques of Management Accounting answers the above questions and hundreds more, providing you with the management accounting skills and knowledge you need to understand how the numbers are computed, what they mean, and how managers and finance professionals can work together to use them to improve an organization's competitive stance. From the accounting acumen required to understand financial decisions and formulate specific proposals, to the political, behavioral, and other considerations that can influence senior management's decisions, this step-by-step book is decidedly nontraditional in three important respects: Business Orientation -- Accounting details are discussed only to the extent they are needed to describe the concepts and techniques used in most organizations. Organizational Focus -- Examples from manufacturing, nonmanufacturing, service, and nonprofit organizations are used to illustrate management accounting concepts and principles. Interactive Learning Process -- Throughout each chapter, questions and problems allow you to apply principles to real-world situations -- rather than just memorizing them. With this essential knowledge, you -- and your organization -- can achieve new levels of breakthrough performance.

Contents

• Essentials of full cost accounting
• Cost behavior
• Differential cost accounting
• Absorption costing
• Activity-based costing and variable costing
• Responsibility accounting: an overview
• Key issues in designing the responsibility accounting structure
• Programming
• Operational budgeting
• Measuring and reporting
• Management accounting in context

• A. The reciprocal method of cost allocation
• B. The concept of present value