Well folks if you are going to the Management Accounting Conference in January I will be on a most interesting panel on what do we need to learn about management accounting.

You may well ask what is Steve doing on such a panel? Indeed, Steve asked that very question when he was asked and he reminded organizers he was soon to be ex- CAReditorsteve when the invite was extended. The organizers replied that they knew I had a long term interest in management accounting research BUT more importantly I would think carefully and not be afraid to “call it as I see it!”

Yes I have published four articles on the Balanced Scorecard as Performance Measurement SYstem and I have an audit paper on benchmarking and the BSC where I conceptualize auditors as potential internal/ external users of the BSC to access audit risks. Further I have attended most GMARS conferences in the last decade missing only two of the ten held! I also teach Management Control Systems on occasion and have recently developed a course on risk management and governance that has a management accounting flavour in much of it.

But at the end of the day at best I am a “fellow traveller” in management accounting research so no doubt my thoughts will be considered, if at all, to be more than slightly off the wall! But it is fun to think about it and you know “I will call it as I see it” worts and all!!!