Now you can focus on the concepts, methods, and uses of managerial accounting that will prepare you to become an effective manager in today's business world. This classic MBA text balances managerial accounting coverage with a strong emphasis on management decision-making. You learn how to truly use the financial information, rather than simply perfect your accounting techniques. Core managerial accounting concepts combine with the latest cutting-edge material that's important to today's managers and decision makers. You'll find an emphasis on international issues within today's globalized business environment, the strategic effects of decisions, a focus on ethics that reflects this area of increasing scrutiny, and emphasis on new management accounting trends. Numerous realistic examples and application problems help emphasize process improvement and the integration of financial reporting issues for management decision-making. You also learn to apply managerial accounting tools to the emerging service sector, government, and nonprofit organizations for ongoing business success.

For the authors (of the U. of California at Davis, Dartmouth College, and the U. of Chicago) of this textbook, management accounting should be much less about making computations and more about understanding the business issues for which computation methods have been devised and the real incentive issues that govern how accounting methods are implemented. Their opening overview discusses strategic cost analysis, the value chain, ethical issues, traditional job and process product costing, and activity-based costing and management. Concepts and methods for managerial decision making are then introduced, including the strategic management of costs, quality, and time; cost behavior and methods of estimating cost driver rates; financial modeling; differential cost and revenue analysis; and long-run capital budgeting. The final section of the book concentrates on managerial planning and performance evaluation and contains chapters on budgets as tools for planning and control, profit and cost center performance evaluation, performance evaluation in investment centers, incentive issues, and cost allocation. Annotation ©2007 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Michael W. Maher, Ph.D., is Professor of Management and Accounting at the Graduate School of Management at the University of California, Davis. Prior to teaching at Davis, Dr. Maher taught at the University of Michigan and the University of Chicago. He received his bachelor's degree in accounting from Gonzaga University and his MBA and Ph.D. from the University of Washington (Seattle). He has experience in public accounting (CPA-inactive, state of Washington), has co-managed his own business, and consulted with numerous companies and governmental bodies. Dr. Maher has been active in the Management Accounting Section of the American Accounting Association, including service as president. He has co-authored numerous books, including Cost Management, Cost Accounting, and Internal Control in US Corporations. He has published articles in Management Accounting, Journal of Accounting Research, The Accounting Review, Accounting Horizons, Issues in Accounting Education, British Accounting Review, and numerous other journals. He has won the Competitive Manuscript Award, the AICPA/AAA Notable Contribution to the Literature Award, the Outstanding Tax Manuscript Award, three teaching awards at UC Davis, and the Outstanding Alumni Award from Gonzaga University.Clyde P. Stickney was the Signal Companies' Professor of Management at the Amos Tuck School of Business Administration, Dartmouth College. He received his Ph.D. from Florida State University and served on the faculties of the University of Chicago and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill before joining the faculty of the Tuck School in 1977. He has also taught at the International University of Japan, Swinburne Institute of Technology, and Helsinki School of Economics and Business Administration. Professor Stickney's teaching and research interests center around the interpretation and analysis of financial statements. Recent research has examined the impact of different accounting principles on U.S. versus Japanese price-earnings ratios and the use of financial statement ratios to infer the content and to evaluate the success of corporate-level strategies. He has authored and coauthored books on financial accounting, managerial accounting, and financial statement analysis. Professor Stickney is a member of the American Accounting Association.Roman L. Weil, Ph.D., CMA, CPA, is the V. Duane Rath Professor of Accounting at the Graduate School of Business at the University of Chicago. Dr. Weil received his Ph.D. from Carnegie-Mellon University. He has served on the accrediting committee of the American Association of Collegiate Schools of Business. He has also designed and implemented continuing education programs for partners at the accounting firms of Arthur Andersen and Price Waterhouse as well as for employees at Montgomery Wards. Dr. Weil has co-authored dozens of books. His articles have appeared in Barron's and The Wall Street Journal. He has published more than 80 articles in academic and professional journals. Dr. Weil is a member of the American Accounting Association, The American Economics Association, and the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants. He has served on the Securities and Exchange Commission Advisory Committee on Replacement Cost Accounting and the Financial Accounting Standards Advisory Council.

PART 1. OVERVIEW AND BASIC CONCEPTS. 1. Fundamental Concepts. 2. Measuring Product Costs. 3. Activity-Based Management. PART 2. MANAGERIAL DECISION MAKING. 4. Strategic Management of Costs, Quality, and Time. 5. Cost Drivers and Cost Behavior. 6. Financial Modeling for Short-Term Decision Making. 7. Differential Cost Analysis for Operating Decisions. 8. Capital Expenditure Decisions. PART 3. MOTIVATING MANAGERS TO MAKE GOOD DECISIONS. 9. Profit Planning and Budgeting. 10. Profit and Cost Center Performance Evaluation. 11. Investment Center Performance Evaluation. 12. Incentive Issues. 13. Allocating Costs to Responsibility Centers. Appendix. Compound Interest Examples and Applications. Compound Interest and Annuity Tables. Glossary. Index.