The Role of the Management Accountant: Local Variations and Global Influences

2017 | Business & Finance

From bean counter to business partner, international research shows how difficult it is to define the precise role and purpose of the management accountant. Research on their work has mainly focused on the heterogeneity of management accountants' tasks and roles. Little is known about the respective local contexts in which these tasks and roles are learned and performed. As a result, insights into the historical development, education, and the factors influencing the role are limited. Given that countries differ in terms of the professionalization or status of management accountants; such insights can help explain findings generated in particular institutional contexts. The Role of the Management Accountant aims to bridge this research gap using two perspectives. The first part explores management accountants in a range of key international contexts, including information about the country-specific historical development and education of management accountants as well as their roles and tasks.

The second part focusses on important global developments such as sustainability, the financial crisis and outsourcing, that are influencing or will influence management accountants in the future. The book thus combines the local context of the management accountant with a global overview, and an agenda for future research which will be of great interest to scholars and advanced students in management accounting throughout the world.

Lukas Goretzki (Author)

Erik Strauss (Author)