Daniela Mancini

Accounting Information Systems for Decision Making

This book contains a collection of research papers on accounting information systems including their strategic role in decision processes, within and between companies. An accounting system is a complex system composed of a mix of strictly interrelated elements such as data, information, human resources, IT tool, accounting models and procedures. Accounting information systems are often considered the instrument by default for accounting automation. This book aims to sketch a clear picture of the current state of AIS research, including design, acceptance and reliance, value-addeddecision making, interorganizational links, and process improvements.The contributions in this volume emphasizethat AIS has grown into a powerful strategic tool. The book provides evidence for this observation by examining a wide range of current issues ranging from theory development in AIS to practical applications of accounting information systems. In particular it focuses on themes of growing interest in the realm of XBRL and Financial Reporting, Management Information Systems, IT/IS Audit and IT/IS Compliance. The book will be of interest to financial and managerial accountants and IT/IS practitioners, including information systems managers and consultants.

Trends in accounting information systems

Most of the contents of this book is based on a selection of the research works presented at the track entitled ‘Accounting Information Systems’ of the 2012 Annual Conference of the Italian Chapter of AIS (ItAIS), which was held in Rome, Italy, in September 2012. The aim of the track was to sketch a clear picture of the current state of Accounting Information Systems (AIS) research in a broad sense, including design, acceptance and reliance, value added, decision making, interorganizational links, and process improvements. In particular, despite the fact that accounting information systems are often considered the instrument by default for accounting automation the track starts from a wide definition of the accounting information system, as a complex system composed of a mix of strictly interrelated elements (such as data, information, human resources, IT tools, accounting models and procedures), and basically involved in collecting, classifying, elaborating, recording, storing accounting data.

The Impact of Law on Accounting Information System: An Analysis of IAS/IFRS Adoption in Italian Companies

Recently, several laws (38/2005, 231/2001, 262/2005) have been revising the corporate internal control legislation system in Italy, consequently requiring the accounting information system (AIS) to adapt1. Accounting systems and financial reporting must comply with new law requirements which generate a “corporate impact”. The object of this paper is to examine this corporate impact. Analyzing four Italian listed companies, authors investigate the effects of the adoption of the International Accounting Standard-International Financial Reporting Standard (IAS/IFRS) on the information process, tools, accounting and procedures. The analysis shows that firms use different approaches to implement law requirements; authors develop a model to identify their determinants.

Accounting Information System and Transparency: A Theoretical Framework

This article contributes to the growing literature on transparency by developing a theoretical framework to analyse the relation between the AIS integration level and the transparency level in the Italian public sector. Based on the literature review regarding transparency and IIS, a research model is proposed. The AIS integration level is measured through three dimensions: part integration, full system integration and full information integration. The transparency level is assessed by the following dimensions: formal transparency, quality transparency and full transparency. The framework shows how different AIS integration levels match with various transparency characteristics. Higher levels of AIS integration enable an increase in the characteristics of transparency and guarantee its effectiveness and interactivity. In contrast, lower levels of AIS integration determine a sufficient and minimum degree of transparency that is evaluated only through the existence or the nonexistence of the information on the public organisation website.

Trends of Digital Innovation Applied to Accounting Information and Management Control Systems

The period we live is known as the digital era. The way in which companies work and interact with each other has radically changed. The digitalisation of data, information and flows requires an additional effort of research, especially in the field of accounting information and management control systems, which are under-explored, in order to understand the potentiality, the benefits and the disadvantages of that kind of technologies. The research works published in this book are a selection of the best papers submitted at the Accounting Information Systems track of the XII Annual Conference of the Italian chapter of Association for Information Systems (ItAIS 2014), entitled “Reshaping Organizations through Digital and Social Innovation”.

Using Collaboration Platforms for Management Control Processes: New Opportunities for Integration

Literature have analyzed the relationship between Management Control Systems (MCSs) and Information and Communication Technology (ICTs), with a particular focus on information integrated systems (transaction-oriented information systems as Enterprise Resource Planning software, analysis-oriented information tools as Business Intelligence software). During the latest decades, ICT has generated collaboration platforms, i.e. hardware/software solutions able to connect people in a ‘social’ and safe environment and to provide tools useful to create, organize, search, and share documents, information, ideas, calendars, and so on. Several studies have investigated the organizational implications of such platforms, especially for workgroups, as well as their impacts on sharing knowledge and information, especially in inter-organizational context. But the contribution of collaboration platforms to MCS remains little explored. This study analyses the use of collaboration platforms in research institutions (RIs). Based upon one Italian case study, the article provides a qualitative assessment regarding the introduction of a collaboration platform to support communication flows in the RI. We highlight how this platform has become an important support device for management control processes. We focus on the role of the collaboration platform in each control component and on the way in which it represents an opportunity for a more sophisticated level of integration among those components. The paper aims to contribute both to academia bridging the gap in studies regarding the relationship between MCSs and ICTs, and to practitioners by highlighting collaboration platform usage in a specific context.

Strategie di sostenibilità: dalle motivazioni ai sistemi di misurazione della performance

The paper aims to examine the main changes that performance measurement systems of firms have to face after the adoption of sustainability strategies. The relationship between sustainability strategies and performance measurement systems is analysed along three main dimensions: the reasons that lead to the implementation of sustainability strategies; the changes that these strategies produce within the performance measurement systems; the feedback effects that the revised performance measurement systems determine on the sustainability strategies. We adopted a qualitative research methodology analysing a single case study: ASIA Napoli S.p.A. The case study and the results have been achieved through a theoretical framework built in the first step of the research. The case study allowed to examine the role of legitimacy and reputation when a company chooses to implement sustainability strategies, and confirmed, overall, that the decision to integrate sustainability into business strategy produces changes in performance measurement systems. Our findings showed that the implementation of sustainability strategies produce some changes in the performance measurement systems with regard to the processes and the tools for information and data collection. However, tools for information processing and analysing for decision-making support are less developed. The results also suggested that the measurement of social performance represents an incentive to revise sustainability strategies.

Management control systems and the use of digital platforms: a multi case study comparison

This study investigates the contribution of digital platforms (DPs) to management control systems (MCSs). DPs, generally, provide tools useful to create, organise, search, and share documents, information, ideas, calendars, and so on. Prior studies provided little attention to these platforms and how they can become a tool to support management control processes. In this work, we aim to analyse how DPs affect each components of the MCSs in different organisational contexts using a multi case study comparison. Our findings highlight the impacts of DPs on MCSs and the contribution of DPs to increase the level of integration among MCS components. Moreover, we identify some contingency factors, which influence how DPs affect MCSs. The paper contributes both to theory, filling the gap in studies regarding the relationship between MCSs and information and communication technologies (ICTs), and to practice, showing how a DP could be designed, implemented, and used to improve MCSs.

Regulatory compliance of financial control systems and its implications for accountants. Some evidence from Italian experience

The research examines the compliance of firms with laws and rules concerning accounting information and financial control systems. In particular it investigates the role of accountants and the skills they employ during the adoption of laws and regulations (regulatory compliance). In the preliminary step, the research suggests a reviewed concept of regulatory compliance: it is based on the idea that firms must consider compliance as a strategic opportunity, able to activate key changes in accounting procedures, information tools, organizational roles, control mechanisms. In the following step the research examines how the revised vision of regulatory compliance affects accounting positions, accountants’ role and their skills. Using data collected on a sample of Italian accountants, an empirical research provides some evidences on key skills and competencies requested for an effective regulatory compliance.

Business information systems in a networked, smart and open environment

Network, Smart, and Open are three keywords that nowadays guide information systems (ISs) research. We discuss the relevance that these three topics, concerning technological and organizational innovations (i.e. cloud, smart technologies and networking), play for the development of accounting and management information systems. The aim is to investigate how these innovations could influence ISs, with a particular focus on accounting and management information systems, enhancing their information potentialities and their ability to support decision making processes, and improving accounting methodologies; performance measurement systems; data management; information systems architecture, external and internal reporting.