Inhaltsangabe:Abstract: Traditional management accounting systems are limited in their ability to provide profitability information relevant to management decisions. The problems of inadequate profitability measurement are intensified by the increasing competition in todays international market and the customer sophistication in locating low-cost providers. In response a number of manufacturers and service companies are experimenting with new methods to analyse their profits. The collection and analysis of information on the customer profitability analysis enables management to identify their most attractive customer groups and support them with their scarce resources, turning loss-making making accounts into profitable ones. The project investigate both the theoretical approach of customer profitability analysis and its usage in practice, today. Relevant data was collected by means of a survey and three ease studies. The survey provided information about the extent of knowledge of member of organisations about customer profitability analysis and the use of it in the decision making process. The interviews added deeper knowledge about the application of customer profitability analysis in practice and helped to find new insights to this analysis method. Inhaltsverzeichnis:Table of Contents: TABLE OF ABBREVIATIONS4 TABLE OF FIGURES5 1. CHAPTERPREFACE6 1.1INTRODUCTION6 1.2BACKGROUND8 1.3AIM10 1.4OBJECTIVES10 2. CHAPTERRESEARCH METHODOLOGY11 2.1INTRODUCTION11 2.2AGGREGATION OF SECONDARY DATA11 2.3COLLECTION OF PRIMARY DATA12 2.3.1INTRODUCTION12 2.3.2SELECT THE APPROPRIATE METHOD12 2.3.3THE SURVEY14 2.3.4THE CASE STUDIES15 3. CHAPTERTHE THEORETICAL APPROACH18 3.1INTRODUCTION18 3.2APPLICATION OF THE CUSTOMER PROFITABILITY ANALYSIS18 3.2.1MAKE OPERATING DECISIONS19 3.2.2DEVELOP STRATEGIES20 3.2.3TACTICAL BENEFITS25 3.3HOW IS THE CUSTOMER PROFITABILITY ANALYSIS OBTAINED?28 3.3.1THE FIRST STEP: THE APPROPRIATE CUSTOMER SEGMENTATION28 3.3.2THE SECOND STEP: THE PRINCIPLE OF AVOIDABLE COSTS AND UNAVOIDABLE COSTS 30 3.3.3THE THIRD STEP: COST ALLOCATION34 3.4TRE CUSTOMER PROFITABILITY ANALYSIS TACTICALLY AND PRACTICALLY44 3.4.1THE DECISION GRID44 3.4.2CUSTOMER PROFITABILITY ANALYSIS, A DAY-TO-DAY OPERATION?47 3.4.3WHO IS RESPONSIBLE FOR THE CUSTOMER'S PROFIT?48 3.4.4REVIEW OF EXISTING SURVEYS48 3.5CONCLUSION49 4. CHAPTERSURVEY52 4.1INTRODUCTION52 4.2KEY-ISSUES52 4.3SAMPLE SELECTION PROCEDURE AND DATA [...]

Management Accounting in Support of Strategy explores how management accounting can support the strategic management process of analysis, formulation, implementation, evaluation, monitoring, and control. If the management accountant is to add value to the business they need to understand how the business works. The toolbox available to the management accountant does not just contain the accounting techniques, but also includes the strategy models and frameworks described in this book. Armed with this array of tools the management accountant is well placed to add significant value to the business. The reader will gain an understanding of the strategic management framework, strategic models and tools, and how management accounting can support the strategic management process. It will be beneficial for undergraduate and postgraduate course students studying strategy or management accounting. The book will also enable practicing accountants to understand how they can make a significant contribution to the success of their organization by demonstrating how management accounting can be used in support of strategy.

Selden and Colvin show readers how to analyze customer data to understand how to get the most out of the most critical customer segments. The authors reveal how some companies (such as Best Buy and Fidelity Investments) have already moved in this direction, and what customercentric strategies are likely to become widespread in the coming years.

An extraordinarily new business slant on how companies can generate greater profits in 23 compact lessons with ongoing tutorials between two fictitious individuals. In the past, companies taught their employees about quality. In today's unstable economy, employers must stress the importance of profitability. Now with scores of examples from the global marketplace, the bestselling coauthor of The Profit Zone and Profit Patterns takes you to a higher level in the art of business. Each of the twenty-three chapters in this concise, challenging book presents a different, powerful business model...and a provocative dialogue between an extraordinary teacher called David Zhao and his young protégé. Revealed are the invisible but significant governing principles that allow businesses to survive and prosper in any economic climate. By participating in each session with the exuberant, challenging master, you too will learn how your company and your competitors generate profit...what approach best applies to your profit-making strategy...what specific actions your organization can take in the next ninety days to improve its bottom line...and more.

In this pathbreaking book, world-renowned Harvard Business School service firm experts James L. Heskett, W. Earl Sasser, Jr. and Leonard A. Schlesinger reveal that leading companies stay on top by managing the service profit chain. Why are a select few service firms better at what they do -- year in and year out -- than their competitors? For most senior managers, the profusion of anecdotal "service excellence" books fails to address this key question. Based on five years of painstaking research, the authors show how managers at American Express, Southwest Airlines, Banc One, Waste Management, USAA, MBNA, Intuit, British Airways, Taco Bell, Fairfield Inns, Ritz-Carlton Hotel, and the Merry Maids subsidiary of ServiceMaster employ a quantifiable set of relationships that directly links profit and growth to not only customer loyalty and satisfaction, but to employee loyalty, satisfaction, and productivity. The strongest relationships the authors discovered are those between (1) profit and customer loyalty; (2) employee loyalty and customer loyalty; and (3) employee satisfaction and customer satisfaction. Moreover, these relationships are mutually reinforcing; that is, satisfied customers contribute to employee satisfaction and vice versa. Here, finally, is the foundation for a powerful strategic service vision, a model on which any manager can build more focused operations and marketing capabilities. For example, the authors demonstrate how, in Banc One's operating divisions, a direct relationship between customer loyalty measured by the "depth" of a relationship, the number of banking services a customer utilizes, and profitability led the bank to encourage existing customers to further extend the bank services they use. Taco Bell has found that their stores in the top quadrant of customer satisfaction ratings outperform their other stores on all measures. At American Express Travel Services, offices that ticket quickly and accurately are more profitable than those which don't. With hundreds of examples like these, the authors show how to manage the customer-employee "satisfaction mirror" and the customer value equation to achieve a "customer's eye view" of goods and services. They describe how companies in any service industry can (1) measure service profit chain relationships across operating units; (2) communicate the resulting self-appraisal; (3) develop a "balanced scorecard" of performance; (4) develop a recognitions and rewards system tied to established measures; (5) communicate results company-wide; (6) develop an internal "best practice" information exchange; and (7) improve overall service profit chain performance. What difference can service profit chain management make? A lot. Between 1986 and 1995, the common stock prices of the companies studied by the authors increased 147%, nearly twice as fast as the price of the stocks of their closest competitors. The proven success and high-yielding results from these high-achieving companies will make The Service Profit Chain required reading for senior, division, and business unit managers in all service companies, as well as for students of service management.