Evolving Changes in Management Accounting: Then vs Now

RUNNING HEAD: Management Accounting
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Management Accounting

Management Accounting
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Executive summary
The management accounting is a part of accounting which offers decision making
information for the managers to use in the operations of planning and controlling. It includes
the planning and monitoring of organizations and provides information to develop
performance measures. It enables expertise in the financial reporting and assists the
management of an organization to formulate and implement the strategy. Traditionally, the
role of the management accountant was to satisfy an organization’s reporting obligation. But
the traditional management accounting is not suitable for the modern businesses thus require
a new management accounting system to be generated. This essay provides an overview of
the changing roles of management accountants in the last 10 years. The evolving changes of
the management accounting have been discussed. The comparison is made in the form of
‘then versus now’. The skills are also discussed which are important for the management
accountants to possess. The main drivers which affect the skills are defined over the past 10
years.

Management Accounting
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Contents
Executive summary...............................................................................................................................1
Evolving changes of Management Accounting.....................................................................................3
Skills required for the management accountants and the way they are changed over the past 10 years.4
Strategic thinking...............................................................................................................................4
Analytical Abilities............................................................................................................................5
Business Acumen..............................................................................................................................6
Management Abilities........................................................................................................................7
Appropriate knowledge in the Management accounting and operations............................................8
Conclusion.............................................................................................................................................9
References...........................................................................................................................................10

Management Accounting
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Evolving changes of Management Accounting
The management accounting has not changed much in the last 10 years. There has been a
significant improvement in the technology and environmental areas. The traditional
management accounting is still valuable but some management accounting techniques were
not used as expectation such as activity-based accounting (ABC) and strategic management
accounting. The development of information technology has enhanced the management
accounting to a higher level. It provides access to the managers to use information in real
time. The managers can also conduct the task of accountants by themselves like budgeting
and analyze (Van der Stede, 2016). The evolving changes in the management accounting
have brought substantial effect on forecasting than budgeting. So, the managers can forecast
by themselves. The budgeting was traditional work for accountants.
If the changes in the management accounting are overviewed than the two factors brought
change in the operations of management accounting. These factors are external and internal.
The external factors force an organization to change it’s internal structure in order to compete
with improved technology. The modern management accountants are more involved in the
accounting matters than the previous years (Appelbaum, Kogan, Vasarhelyi & Yan, 2017).
The managers require more information than before for the decision making and organization
matters for the profitable results. The internal factors like decision making entail advance
information and efficient modes to accomplish such tasks. So, these days have the majority of
information management accountant and are computerized and easily accessible at all levels
of an organization. The managers can easily monitor the performance of accountants easily.
The development in the management accounting has replaced the traditional methods where
managers could evaluate the progress at the end of the month (Van Essen, Otten & Carberry,
2015). Nowadays the managers can generate information without referring to the financial
analysts.
The role of management accounting has increased than before at the corporate, national and
international level. The focus of accountants is always to improve the performance and
profitability of an organization. The changes in the environment and the economic factors
have changed the approach in the recent time. The noticeable change is considered in the
form of a great deal of management accounting work which is driven by the need for
compliance and control. Now the focus on competitive support has increased than the need