COURSE NUMBER: EWMBA224A-1

COURSE TITLE: Managerial Accounting

UNITS OF CREDIT: 2 Units

INSTRUCTOR: Dennis Geyer

E-MAIL ADDRESS: dgeyer@haas.berkeley.edu

CLASS WEB PAGE LOCATION (HTTP URL): Catalyst

MEETING DAY(S)/TIME: Tuesdays, 6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m.

PREREQUISITE(S): EWMBA202, Financial Reporting

CLASS FORMAT: Combination of lecture and case discussions.

REQUIRED READINGS: Textbook and case handouts.

BASIS FOR FINAL GRADE: Combination of midterm, final, class participation, and an optional case write-up to substitute for final exam

ABSTRACT OF COURSE'S CONTENT AND OBJECTIVES:
An introductory course providing an overview of the managerial use of financial and nonfinancial information for a variety of purposes including managerial decision analysis, external financial reporting, strategic product costing, organizational planning and performance evaluation. The emphasis is on developing and using information to support value creation by management. The course is divided into five parts:

Part A. Basic Cost Concepts
This part involves an introduction to basic cost concepts. A distinction is made between the measurement principles used in cost accounting for external financial reporting purposes and those used in activity-based systems used for product costing and strategic initiatives.

Part B. Cost Analysis for Decision-Making
This part explores the analysis of financial and nonfinancial information to evaluate the economic impact of decisions to acquire and deploy resources. It involves a framework for analyzing both short-term and long-term decisions that includes an evaluation of incremental, sunk and opportunity costs.

Part C. Cost Accounting Systems
This part presents the development and use of cost accounting systems for external financial reporting purposes. It illustrates the relationship among cost accumulation, cost allocation, and cost application systems. The emphasis is on cost measurement for inventory valuation purposes.

Part D. Cost Planning & Control Systems
This part describes how organizations develop and use budgets for planning and expenditure control. Various approaches to budgeting are introduced including static, flexible, functional, and activity-based budgeting. Students are also exposed to the design and use of managerial performance evaluation systems.

Part E. Cost Management Systems
This part focuses on understanding the causes of cost and using this information to manage an organization’s processes and the resources necessary to support them. It describes contemporary approaches to cost management based on resource consumption including strategic, life-cycle, and activity-based cost management systems.

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH:
Dennis Geyer has an international reputation as an expert in cost management and is recognized as an authority on activity-based management (ABM) including activity-based costing (ABC) and activity-based budgeting (ABB). His consulting practice specializes in strategic pricing, cost & performance measurement, cost reduction strategies, and strategic operations analysis. By linking business process analysis with finance, Mr. Geyer helps his clients identify opportunities to increase financial performance through improved operational design. Mr. Geyer has provided strategic advisory and systems design services to numerous clients in a wide variety of industries including banking, manufacturing, telecommunications, transportation and healthcare. Dennis is also sought after as a speaker and educator. Besides serving on the faculty at the Haas School of Business, Dennis has traveled extensively, conducting public and customized seminars primarily to executive audiences in the U.S., Latin America and Southeast Asia.