Hey guys,
One of my subjects at uni asks me to do some in-depth research on a company's management accounting system, which means I have to ask companies about their systems. I'm having trouble finding any company that are willing to help and totally regret not resigning from work a few weeks after semester started.
If you guys have any advice on how I could go about this or know anyone who could assist me that would be great. Even willing to fork out my Ozbargain savings if I have to.
Cheers.
No no I meant the system they use to manage their resources e.g staff, assets etc so what their business strategy is, KSFs, and how their structures and performance measurements reflect that; stuff that any intelligent and switched on employee would know most of.
Tutor is new even she says it's a tough task. Emailed the course co-ordinator, they haven't replied. It's definitely a challenging for us to all go out there and do that, but I guess it is what it is and I need to figure out a way to do this assignment since half of my group is still sleeping on it.
Quitting job as in, I resigned a week before uni started, if I had waited just 3-4 weeks more ( after being introduced to the assignment), it would have been a lot easier to ask them instead of going cold calling and emailing companies. I did email them tho, see how they respond.
This information is quite possibly available in public business' annual reports. They usually have some sort of mumbo jumbo about how they do their business, their structures, etc. for the information of stakeholders.
Can you do your assignment on the university's management accounting system? Surely, they wouldn't reject you as its part of your course?
Hah! That's a great Idea! will try that, see how we go.
Sorry to disappoint you, but I'm pretty sure your university will say no, because that would be unfair to other students in your course. Perhaps try another university.
yeah u're probably right but worth a crack
SAP is a management system used among corporates.
May consider look up its website, speak to their sales and ask for testimonials. Have seen testimonial videos from its corporate clients who may be willing to assist.
Good Luck with a HD.
If you had a rough idea of the information you require, you could create a detailed questionnaire and email it to various companies (customer service or investor relations) explaining the purpose of the questionnaire and your objectives and also comment that you would appreciate if they would be willing to review the information over the phone/in person. I would suggest picking some larger firms/organisations that are resourced to provide a response.
I remember having to do this sort of thing and it's a real tough ask.
The current business that I am working for is in the process of closing down (yep, manufacturing is dying in Australia, and not just holden and ford!) otherwise I would invite you to interview me or one of my colleagues. BTW we use SAP
thanks for the suggestions guys I really appreciate it and will put them into use :)
They are not gonna volunteer any specific information about this. Just the general ones.
So go for a small company, guess what they are using and just be imaginative.
Tutors won't have time to verify every information out there by calling the company's representative.
Even if they want to and have the time, they won't be able to find it as information is not freely available.
It's a hard task. Very few companies are willing to share this kind of information. I had to do a similar project about a business so l picked one l was interested in and made contact with the managers and explained how l did some research and was impressed and would appreciate some of their time to tell their side of the sstory on the business world. I manage to get them to share what l needed and got their consent to write my project.
I wish i could offer you more help but i know my company doesn't allow those request. BTW we use SAP.
I'd say try with a small company, your odds of success will be higher.
I don't mean to sound unkind but if I got this request out of the blue from someone with no relationship to the company whatsoever, I'd decline it in a heartbeat because of a) too much time pressure at work already without spending time on non value adds and b) commercial sensitivity. Your course coordinator sounds like a professional academic with no idea about how the real world works.
Do you have friends / relos who can give you an introduction to a company?
I have a small business in Sydney (mortgage broking). It's only me, 1 staff member and a couple of contractors and obviously due to the industry I'm in I don't need stock management etc so I have relatively basic requirements. In terms of accounting I've just switched from MYOB to Xero. Target setting and business planning/monitoring is done through proprietary software.
I wouldn't be comfortable opening up my books to you but if you have more general questions, I'd be happy to help a fellow ozbargainer out if I can. Let me know if you need anything from me.
I think you might have luck obtaining online the corporate plans of government departments. Ones that identify performance indicators. Local councils produce heaps of these directional documents each year. Like googling "corporate plan" and " performance measures/indicators" and see what PDFs are linked. Not the best example but this is the type of stuff that comes up, but this is just their strategy regarding procurement https://www.det.nsw.edu.au/media/downloads/about-us/how-we-o…
Depends on what you need to know about it - which would be tied into what subject you are studying.
You could explain your problem to your tutor and ask what you should do and what is actually expected - it seems a little strange to ask you to to research a company's accounting system. Not many companies would just give you free access to information about their accounting.
If if was literally the system (i.e. software) then why not go to the software companies and ask for a demo of their products, most have demo logins or sales information that will give you an understanding of that side of it.
Am a bit confused as to what you are saying about quitting your job? If you are still employed then why not ask your own company?