Week 4: Fundamentals Of Management Accounting Afte

Week 4: Fundamentals of management accountingAfter discussing the importance of financial reporting in the first 3 weeks of the module, this week focuses on the fundamentals of management accounting.Listen to the following introduction to the next sections of this module from Dr. Andrews:In contrast to financial accounting, which is external in focus, management accounting focuses on information for decision making with an internal emphasis and where the information is generally not as freely or openly available in the public domain as published financial reports. Any organisation, irrespective of size, needs to have an understanding of its costs and revenues in order to optimise the use of scarce resources and make a profit (or in the case of a not-for-profit organisation, allocate resources effectively). This week introduces some important concepts in relation to what drives costs within an organisation and how management accounting is vital in terms of making decisions about pricing of services and products with reference to their cost.Learning ObjectivesBy the end of this week, you will:Upon completion of this week, students will have achieved the following objectives:Compare management accounting information systems and financial accounting dataCritically evaluate the importance of, and differences between, alternative cost structures