Boris Popesko

COST VARIABILITY AND COST BEHAVIOUR IN MANUFACTURING ENTERPRISES

ABSTRACT. The paper is focused to the variability of costs, cost behaviour and discusses the issues of sticky costs. The main goal of this paper is to analyze the issue of the authors project targeted at the topic of cost behaviour and its projection to the costing systems and confront it with the current state of knowledge in the field. Special attention is paid to the phenomenon of the sticky cost It highlights the importance of this topic at this time of adverse economic developments.The first part of the paper analyzes the general historical changes in the enterprises cost structures. There is also analyzed the cost behaviour and variability of costs due to the standard view of company performance. Attention is also paid to current view on the issue of costing systems and costing methods.In the second part there are presented findings of completed surveys as proof of the relevance of this issue. From the researches it was found that in recent years there has been a rise in the share of indirect costs up to 40% (till 2009), while almost half of the companies shows steady growth in the portion of these costs. Discussion then follows of this section, in which special attention is paid to area of sticky costs. The author further provides additional research hypotheses and research questions which underlines the need for further exploration of this issue.JEL Classification : D23, D24Keywords: cost behaviour, cost variability, sticky costs, cost remanence, variable costs, fixed costs, cost management.IntroductionCost management is one of the most important issue of company performance and company financial management. Also the issue of the costing systems, methods and techniques is one of the important features of cost management and management accounting. We can observe a continuously growing importance of cost management systems quality that is caused by dramatic changes in business environment. Ecological, economical, social and environmental problems, as well as challenges connected with developing of the consumers, make the companies concerned with existing level and quality of relationship between them and the society, their employees and their consumers. On the one hand new challenges and expectations of the consumers force the companies to develop and introduce policies which foresee their strategy as for dealing with social, ecological and other problems. On the other hand such actions of the companies positively influence their image, increase competitiveness and lead to higher market value (Bilan, 2013).Due to growing competition on globalized markets, companies need the more accurate information about the profitability of their products, customers or markets. All these problems carry higher need for understanding of the consumed costs by different activities and other different areas where the costs play the important role. This change in the business environment is associated also with the suitable change of structure and organization of company activities and structure of products. The importance of these problems has significantly increased during the economic crisis, because many enterprises in the world reduced their performance. According to Belas et al. (2014) average performance of small and medium enterprises decreased by 15.80% in the Czech Republic and 18.78% in Slovakia at this time.The main goal of this paper is to discuss the problems related to the cost behaviour, variability of cost groups and the stickiness of costs in relation to researches carried out by this articles author. The special focus of this paper is to analyze the previously performed research surveys in this field and introduce the importance of the cost variability issues in context of manufacturing companies in Czech Republic. Effort of this paper is also to demonstrate the inadequacy of traditional assessment of cost behaviour based only on the relationship to the volume of production. …

Cost Analysis of Selected Patient Categories Within A Dermatology Department Using an ABC Approach

Background: Present trends in hospital management are facilitating the utilization of more accurate costing methods, which potentially results in superior cost-related information and improved managerial decision-making. However, the Activity-Based Costing method (ABC), which was designed for cost allocation purposes in the 1980s, is not widely used by healthcare organizations. This study analyzes costs related to selected categories of patients, those suffering from psoriasis, varicose ulcers, eczema and other conditions, within a dermatology department at a Czech regional hospital. Methods: The study was conducted in a hospital department where both inpatient and outpatient care are offered. Firstly, the diseases treated at the department were identified. Further costs were determined for each activity using ABC. The study utilized data from managerial and financial accounting, as well as data obtained through interviews with departmental staff. Using a defined cost-allocation procedure makes it possible to determine the cost of an individual patient with a given disease more accurately than via traditional costing procedures. Results: The cost analysis focused on the differences between the costs related to individual patients within the selected diagnoses, variations between inpatient and outpatient treatments and the costs of activities performed by the dermatology department. Furthermore, comparing the costs identified through this approach and the revenue stemming from the health insurance system is an option. Conclusions: Activity-Based Costing is more accurate and relevant than the traditional costing method. The outputs of ABC provide an abundance of additional information for managers. The benefits of this research lie in its practically-tested outputs, resulting from calculating the costs of hospitalization, which could prove invaluable to persons involved in hospital management and decision-making. The study also defines the managerial implications of the performed cost analysis for the hospital management. Based on the analysis results, it is possible to standardize activities and performance appraisal (Benchmarking), and provide all necessary information for hospital budgeting practices, especially Activity-Based Budgeting (ABB).

Are Men More Innovative and Aggressive in Business? Case Study from the Czech Republic

Abstract SMEs make a major contribution to the growth and employment in the EU. In today’s fierce competition in the market economic activities the SMEs had gradually developed into a major force for national economic and social development in every country of world. The aim of this article is to examine the approach to innovativeness and competitive aggressiveness between males and females in the segment of small and medium-sized enterprises. Based on the results of the questionnaire which was conducted in May 2015 in the Czech Republic we tried to test four hypotheses on the relationship between the gender of entrepreneurs of SMEs and their attitude to innovativeness and competitive aggressiveness. The results of our research have pointed out some differences between genders. Men-entrepreneurs who do business in the segment of SMEs in the Czech Republic are slightly more innovative and are significantly more aggressive in regard to competitors than women, as they apply aggressive approach and their companies are perceived as aggressive.

The maturity of a budgeting system and its influence on corporate performance

In recent decades, the features making up corporate budgeting systems have been profoundly deliberated over by academics and professionals. Indeed, so-called traditional methods of budgeting have borne the brunt of severe criticism due to their inflexibility and the sheer amount of time they demand of employees. Nonetheless, several examples exist of budgeting systems that have somehow been transformed, and of organizations which have adopted advanced, flexible budgeting procedures based on evaluation of performance. In the study presented, the authors look into any relationships that may exist between the primary elements of corporate budgeting systems and their performance in the enterprise. The aim is to contribute towards existing knowledge by: 1) summarizing the latest advances that relate to budgeting and corporate performance; 2) reporting on current budgeting practices applied by companies in the Czech Republic, with analysis of how budgeting systems affect managerial behaviour; 3) evaluating any statistical dependence between selected features of corporate budgeting systems; i.e. utilizing a budget as a managerial tool, how enterprises express the added value of budgeting systems, endeavour on the part of management in implementing an effective budgeting system, the workload pertaining to individual components of a budgeting system, and the significance of a budgeting system in comparison with other tools designed for adapting to change in market conditions. In general, the study describes interconnections between the profit-based performance of firms and the majority of the factors and features of the budgeting systems examined.