Drivers of change in management accounting practices in an ERP environment

This study contributes to contemporary research on changes in management accounting (MA) practices by examining the effect of changes in data quality, information quality and management accountants’ tasks on accounting efficiency and effectiveness, and indirectly on management accounting change after the implementation of an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system. Data was collected through an online survey questionnaire distributed to Finnish companies. Overall, the results of the PLS tests (n=70) provide significant support for the proposed model. Consistent with previous studies, time since ERP adoption appears to be a significant determinant of MA change, but the findings of this study also suggest that late adopters, that is, firms adopting an ERP system more recently, perceive greater changes in MA than early adopters. Further, the results indicate that global ERP implementations and use of business intelligence (BI) tools significantly relate to changes in MA practices. The implications of these results for practice and future research are discussed.