Mohamed E. Bayou

Critical thinking in accounting education: processes, skills and applications

Explains that many prestigious bodies, including the American Assembly of Collegiate Schools of Business and the Accounting Change Commission, have asked accounting educators to improve their students’ critical thinking skills. Suggests that the literature contains few examples of how to apply such skills in an accounting environment and how to teach such skills as efficiently as possible. Explains and provides examples of such critical thinking skills. Shows how to incorporate such skills in the classroom.

Three routes for target costing

Suggests that many Western managers find target costing hard to understand, gives an overview of the Japanese approach and explains three paths towards rational cost decrease: cost improvement, cost cutting and cost shifting. Emphasizes the importance of cost improvement in a total cost management (TCM) programme and the other strategies which should support it, e.g. comprehensiveness, integration, flexibility and dynamism. Recognizes that the weaknesses which may develop in a TCM programme can divert cost improvement into cost cutting or cost shifting but sees this as no more than a short‐term solution.

Analyzing the product‐mix decision by using a fuzzy hierarchical model

The product‐mix decision has received considerable attention in management accounting and economics literatures. However, many studies in these literatures are contradicting, inconclusive and lack rigorous analysis of this complex decision. They seek to develop weights for the products in the product mix based on one objective, to maximize the firm’s profit ability. But before developing these weights, the studies must first rank these products, Ranking is a complex endeavor since it is often driven by a multitude of hierarchical financial and non‐financial goals and objectives. Ranking is also difficult due to the use of complex concepts such as time, uncertainty, cost and interdependencies between accounting systems and manufacturing systems and among the products of the product mix. These concepts are inherently fuzzy and coextensively applied often with a confluence of variables operating simultaneously. This paper applies an advanced mathematical model to account for the product mix decision. The mod...

Developing an instrumental capacity model for industry

Discusses the difficulties of measuring, defining and managing capacity; and develops a model which splits it into two components (resource and ability) plus several sub‐components, and recognizes the interfaces between them. Illustrates and defines the sub‐components and identifies three states of capacity loading: resource‐loaded (over‐resourced), ability‐loaded (e.g. over‐qualified staff) and even‐capacity (i.e. resources compatible with ability). Asserts that the relative capacities of firms within an industry form a “capacity curve” with ability‐loaded small firms, medium firms at even capacity and large firms resource‐loaded. Analyses 1994‐1997 data for the US electronics and electrical equipment industry to plot its capacity curve, explains the methodology used, and shows how the regression model can be applied to individual firms within the industry to improve capacity management. Recognizes the limitations of the study.

Using the fuzzy‐analytic‐hierarchical‐process to select the optimum mechanism for developing accounting standards

Purpose - Recent corporate failures such as Enron, WorldCom, Global Crossing and K-Mart and auditing failures such as Arthur Andersen have sparked great public concern, including the passage of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002. This paper aims to address the development of accounting standards. Design/methodology/approach - The approach is to use the fuzzy-analytical-hierarchical-process (FAHP), recently developed by de Korvin and Klyele. Uncertainty in assigning priorities and the use of semantic variables lead naturally to the inclusion of fuzzy sets in the structure of the AHP paradigm. The hierarchy of decisions, constructed sequentially, consists of three levels of attributes. Findings - The paper shows that applying the highly sophisticated mathematical FAHP model is needed to select the optimum mechanism for establishing accounting and auditing standards. The FAHP application results lead to a rational ranking of the four bases to develop accounting standards. Originality/value - This paper helps to explain the ambiguous and vague nature of the attributes of financial reporting and to apply a recently developed mathematical methodology to help accounting policy makers select the optimum mechanism for developing accounting standards.

ACCOUNTING FOR COST INTERACTIONS IN DESIGNING PRODUCTS

Since quality cannot be manufactured or tested into a product but must be designed in, effective product design is a prerequisite for effective manufacturing. However, the concept of effective product design involves a number of complexities. First, product design often overlaps with such design types as engineering design, industrial design and assembly design. Second, while costs are key variables in product design, costing issues often arise that add more complexities to this concept. The management accounting literature provides activity-based costing (ABC) and target costing techniques to assist product design teams. However, when applied to product design these techniques are often flawed. First, the product “user” and “consumer” are not identical as often assumed in target costing projects, and instead of activities driving up the costs, managers may use budgeted costs to create activities to augment their managerial power by bigger budgets and to protect their subordinates from being laid off. Second, each of the two techniques has a limited costing focus, activity-based costing (ABC) focusing on indirect costs and target costing on unit-level costs. Third, neither technique accounts for resource interactions and cost associations. This paper applies the new method of associative costing (Bayou & Reinstein, 2000) that does not contain these limitations. To simplify the intricate procedures of this method, the paper outlines and illustrates nine steps and applies them to a hypothetical scenario, a design of a laptop computer intended for the college-student market. This method uses the well-known statistical techniques of clustering, Full Factorial design and analysis-of-variance. It concludes that in product design programs, the design team may need to make tradeoff decisions on a continuum beginning with the design-to-cost point and ending at the cost-to-design extreme, as when the best perceived design and the acceptable cost level of this design are incongruent.

A MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING TAXONOMY FOR THE MASS CUSTOMIZATION APPROACH

The traditional product-costing continuum is too limited to account for the new mass customization approach currently used by many corporations in many industries. Mass customization has changed the nature of many transactions, activities and, indeed, the very essence of many manufacturing companies, who have become more of assemblers than manufacturers. These new developments necessitate establishing new way of accounting for proper planning and control. After tracing the development of the mass customization approach from modular manufacturing into common platforms applied in one firm, and then shared by a group of firms, the paper explains the benefits of these approaches to both manufacturers and their suppliers. The central theme of this paper is to develop a product costing system for mass customization. It begins with the traditional product-process matrix in operations management literature and adds to it two elements: firm size and the modular manufacturing method. The rationale for this addition is that modular manufacturing is the best mass customization method; firm size and mass customization are inherently related as indicated by the typical evolutionary pattern of production processes. At this point, the operations management taxonomy is renamed the modular-process matrix; this matrix displays three groups of major activities: manufacturing, supplemental manufacturing, and assembling activities. These three activity groups provide the basis for developing a new set of accounts and a ledger system to account for specific customer orders developed by mass-customization processes.

Accounting for a system of corporate knowledge

Many corporate managers and researchers now frequently rank intellectual assets ahead of physical assets in developing a competitive edge, primarily due to such factors as shorter life cycles, frequent changes, adoption of advanced technologies and increasing global competition. Given the accounting literature’s inadequate attention to these important resources, this paper develops a systemic view called a “system of corporate knowledge”. This system includes the components, environment and structure of intellectual assets. Components include critical thinking, creative thinking and innovation. The environment includes organization climate and organization learning into which the system’s components operate and culminate through the integration of all applied thinking types. The system’s structure is shown mathematically by a dynamic equation. The mathematical model is a form of reductionism necessary to bring such a complex system of corporate knowledge to a manageable level. Controllers and managers can then use the system to explain the mechanism of the knowledge development or lack thereof. Since the system operates dynamically, spiral functions are applied to help controllers and managers graphically present the trends in the system.

Resolving the Sunk Cost Conflict

Abstract Purpose Compare and contrast how the accounting, organizational behavior and other literatures analyze sunk costs. Sunk costs form a key part of the decision-making component of the management accounting literature, which generally include previously incurred and unrecoverable costs. Management accountants believe, since current or future actions cannot change sunk costs, decision makers should ignore them. Thus, ongoing fixed costs or previously incurred sunk costs, while relevant for matters of accountability such as costing, income determination, and performance evaluation are irrelevant for most short- and long-term decisions. However, the organizational behavior literature indicates that sunk costs affect decision makers’ actions – especially their emotional attachments to the related project and the asymmetry of attitudes regarding the recognizing of losses and gains. Called the “sunk cost effect” or “sunk cost fallacy,” this conflict in sunk costs’ underlying nature reflects one element of incoherence in contemporary accounting discourse. We discuss this sunk cost conflict from an accounting and a philosophical perspective to denote some ambiguities that decision usefulness and accountability introduces into accounting discourse. Methodology/approach Review, summarize and analyze the above literatures Findings Managerial accountants can apply many lessons from the various literature sources. Originality/value We also show how differing opinions on how to treat sunk costs impact a firm’s decision-making process both economically and socially.

Using Fuzzy Set Theory to Help Resolve Governmental Hospitals’ Health Care Decision Conflicts

Abstract While cost allocation decisions attract considerable attention in the management accounting literature, many studies are contradicting and inconclusive. They often seek to develop product or service weights in order to make operating decisions with the sole objective of maximizing the firm’s profitability. But before developing these weights, the studies must first rank these products – which is a complex endeavor that is often driven by many hierarchical financial and nonfinancial goals and objectives. Ranking is also difficult due to using such complex concepts as time, uncertainty, cost, and interdependencies between accounting systems and manufacturing systems and among the products of the product mix. These concepts are inherently fuzzy and coextensively applied often with a confluence of variables operating simultaneously. This paper applies an advanced mathematical model to account for a hospital cost allocation decisions in treating spinal cord injuries (SCI). The model combines the powers of fuzzy set theory (Zadeh, 1965) and the analytic hierarchy process (Saaty, 1978). The precise ratings required in the conventional analytic hierarchy process but practically hard to obtain are replaced by naturally semantic variables by using the fuzzy set concept. de Korvin and Kleyle’s (1999) fuzzy-analytic-hierarchical process (FAHP) then develop these ambiguous variables. FAHP can help to optimize decisions involving ambiguous variables and the web of prioritized strategies and goals of cost leadership, product differentiation, financial objectives of earnings, cash flows, and market share and nonfinancial goals such as tradition and owners’ convictions and philosophies. We use data from seven Michigan SCI facilities in applying the FAHP model to rank and otherwise develop more optimal strategies and goals and compare our results to the decisions of hospital management.