Search results

The librarian and researcher have to be able to uncover specific articles in their areas of interest. This Bibliography is designed to help. Volume IV, like Volume III, contains features to help the reader to retrieve relevant literature from MCB University Press' considerable output. Each entry within has been indexed according to author(s) and the Fifth Edition of the SCIMP/SCAMP Thesaurus. The latter thus provides a full subject index to facilitate rapid retrieval. Each article or book is assigned its own unique number and this is used in both the subject and author index. This Volume indexes 29 journals indicating the depth, coverage and expansion of MCB's portfolio.

This volume of Advances in Management Accounting begins with an article by C. J. McNair, Lidija Polutnik, Holly H. Johnston, Jason Augustyn and Charles R. Thomas on shifting perspectives involving accounting, visibility, and management action. The article attempts to determine whether or not the accounting abstraction appears to dominate the manager’s perceptions of the physical reality of the firm’s utilization of its physical assets. The article then looks at whether changes in the accounting abstraction (e.g. the addition of capacity cost management reports and measurements) lead to changes in how managers perceive and use their physical assets. Using a cognitive decision-making structure developed by Wagenaar et al. (1995), this study explores the interplay between the structure and nature of capacity reporting (the surface structure of the decision) and the subsequent analysis and choice of managers within the firm (the deep structure of the decision).

“Statistical decision theory is a theory of decision‐making, i.e., of selecting among alternatives. It is not a theory of problem solving, i.e., of finding the cause of a particular set of symptoms. Thus, if the problem or opportunity is defined poorly even the best analysis thereafter will be of limited value. In fact, it could be detrimental”.

THE 31st annual meeting of the Library Association passed off very comfortably at Brighton, and if nothing particularly momentous occurred affecting librarianship, everybody enjoyed the various entertainments and the breezy weather. Brighton certainly deserved the title to breeziness which it claims, because it was stormy nearly every night or early morning during the run of the Conference, and members must be congratulated on the lucky manner in which it was found possible to dodge the showers.

This study examines how firms’ use of competitor-focused accounting information, specifically competitor monitoring information, impacts their pricing, demand, and overall revenue performance. The monitoring activities examined are the scope of monitoring, monitoring above and below one’s own hotel class (i.e., market segment), and the extent of reciprocity of monitoring. Competitor analysis is a central element in strategic management accounting (SMA), yet little empirical research has been done since companies do not disclose competitor monitoring activities. Proving the value of competitive monitoring provides strong support for SMA. Archival, proprietary monitoring information regarding pricing, demand, and revenue were obtained from one of the largest hotel markets in the United States. Using regression, we modeled the relationships between performance measures (pricing, demand, and revenue) and monitoring behaviors, while controlling for quality (hotel characteristics and management skill), competitive intensity, hotel class, geographic location, and ownership type. Our results indicate that two aspects of competitor monitoring impact hotel pricing that, in turn, impacts hotel demand and revenue performance. Specifically, a hotel monitoring more competitors (what we refer to as Scope) achieves higher prices with unchanged demand, resulting in higher revenue performance. Most hotels monitor within their class. However, deviating from one’s class has profound outcomes: looking at lower (higher) quality hotels results in a hotel setting lower (higher) prices, resulting in higher (unchanged) demand and lower (higher) revenue performance. Surprisingly, we did not find support for the reciprocity of monitoring. That is, whether the competitors monitored by a hotel, in turn follow the target, has no impact on hotel revenue performance outcomes. While the SMA literature notes the importance of competitor monitoring, this study fills a gap in an important, under-researched area by documenting the link between competitor monitoring behaviors and organizational revenue performance. This may help promote greater diffusion of SMA practices.

Leader member exchange has previously been found to be a solid predictor of positive organizational outcomes. Much research has tested a variety of possible antecedents to Leader Member Exchange (LMX), but only a limited number involving leadership styles. In this study servant leadership dimensions were tested for relationship to LMX quality. Strong correlations were found, tested for collinearity, and the best predictive model identified via regression analysis. The value to leadership educators was highlighted, limitations were recognized, and suggested areas for future research discussed.

The objective of the research, and paper, is to determine first whether or not the accounting abstraction appears to dominate the manager’s perceptions of the physical reality of the firm’s utilization of its physical assets, and second, whether changes in the accounting abstraction (e.g. the addition of Capacity cost management reports and measurements) lead to changes in how managers perceive, and use, their physical assets. Using a cognitive decision-making structure developed by Wagenaar et al. (1995), this study explores the interplay between the structure and nature of capacity reporting (the surface structure of the decision) and the subsequent analysis and choice of managers within the firm (the deep structure of the decision). A five-site field research methodology was used to gather data from companies across a multitude of industry contexts and situations. Results suggest that the nature of capacity measurement and reporting does shape manager’s perceptions of current and potential future performance (the cognitive surface structure), with major implications for the nature and type of decisions and trade-offs made (the deep structure). Specifically, managers appear to make decisions that are illogical when considered in light of the physical reality of their operations based on the representations of this reality (e.g. the capacity measures and reports). Analysis and interpretation of these results suggest that what accounting makes visible appears to drive decision-making and performance in organization.