Total quality accounting

Description

Wherever they have been introduced, total quality concepts such as teamwork, interdepartmental partnerships, and a company-wide dedication to satisfying customer needs have been enthusiastically embraced by managers and line workers alike, and the results have been truly remarkable. But a total quality organization, by definition, is one in which all functions within an organization participate in the quality process. For accounting, this means a radical new involvement in all phases of an operation and a heightened commitment to customer satisfaction and the bottom line - in other words, total quality accounting. Based on Michael Woods's more than twenty years of experience in cost accounting and the implementation of total quality programs, this book was designed to help bring line managers and accountants together to create a total quality accounting process. In it, Woods offers proven techniques and step-by-step guidelines on integrating total quality practices with cost accounting and activity-based costing techniques. Divided into three sections, the first is devoted to introducing accountants to the total quality management (TQM) principles set forth by such luminaries as W. Edwards Deming, Joseph Juran, Philip Crosby, and others, and to how those principles are currently practiced in some of the world's top manufacturing concerns. The second part of Total Quality Accounting familiarizes managers with cost accounting principles. It offers an in-depth look at how cost accounting has been applied in the past, and outlines the significant new changes that have occurred in the era of the total quality movement. In the third part, Woods provides a synthesis of the first two sections. He outlines proven techniques for seamlessly integrating the accounting function with the entire organization to create a total quality accounting process. Accountants are shown how to tailor cost and financial information to the needs of the designers, engineers, managers, and others they service. And conversely, managers learn how to influence the accounting process and to help shape the information they are given. Offering a blueprint for change, Total Quality Accounting is an invaluable resource for management accountants, controllers, CFOs, and cost accountants, as well as production managers and industrial engineers.

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