Janet A. Samuels

Accounting certificate programs: Serving the needs of students while benefiting your university and accounting department

The supply of accounting majors has not kept pace with the increasing demand for accounting graduates. One way of increasing the number of qualified accountants, while maintaining desired quality, is through a non-degree program such as the Post-Baccalaureate Certificate in Accountancy. A certificate program addresses the needs of students who already have a bachelors degree in another discipline and want to gain accounting knowledge. The purpose of this chapter is to assist accounting administrators and faculty in deciding whether a similar program would be feasible and beneficial for their school. We describe the benefits of a certificate program, which include the potential for increased enrollments and an enhanced learning environment. We discuss design alternatives and implementation issues in terms of our program and other certificate programs in the United States. We also discuss the needs and characteristics of certificate students currently enrolled in our program.

The Effect of Goal Conflict on Effort and Performance

While prior goal conflict studies have examined the effects of goal conflict on performance, they have only used assigned goals and constrained time (effort). Rather than only using assigned goals, this study uses both an organizationally assigned goal and an incentive-induced goal. Additionally, time is unconstrained so individuals can exert as much (or as little) effort as they desire. I use a complex multi-period business simulation to experimentally study how goal conflict affects goal commitment, goal conflict effort, relative maximization of performance (performance optimization) and actual performance. My results indicate individuals committed to an organizationally assigned goal that conflicted with their incentive-induced goal and that these individuals experienced goal conflict. Individuals with goal conflict exerted greater effort as compared to individuals without goal conflict. Individuals with conflicting goals achieved significantly greater performance optimization compared to individuals without conflicting goals. Also, individuals with conflicting goals were able to achieve higher performance on the conflicting organizationally assigned goal while simultaneously achieving results similar to the individuals without goal conflict on the incentive-induced goal. Based on these results, I suggest that the negative effects of goal conflict on performance may be mitigated by allowing individuals to determine the amount of effort that they want to devote to the task. Additionally, these results contribute to the debate on connecting incentives to non-financial measures by suggesting that individuals commit to organizationally assigned goals that conflict with incentives.