Cost management : a strategic emphasis / Edward J. Blocher, Paul E. Juras, and Steven D. Smith.

Includes index.

Part One. Introduction to strategy, cost management, and cost systems -- Cost management and strategy -- Implementing strategy: the value chain, the balanced scorecard, and the strategy map -- Basic cost management concepts -- Job costing -- Activity-based costing and customer profitability analysis -- Process costing -- Cost allocation: departments, joint products, and by-products -- Part Two. Planning and decision making -- Cost estimation -- Short-term profit planning: Cost-Volume-Profit (CVP) analysis -- Strategy and the master budget -- Decision making with a strategic emphasis -- Strategy and the analysis of capital investments -- Cost planning for the product life cycle: target costing, theory of constraints, and strategic pricing -- Part Three. Operational-level control -- Operational measurement sales, direct cost variances, and the role of nonfinancial performance measures -- Operational performance measurement indirect cost variances and resource capacity management -- Operational performance measurement further analysis of productivity and sales -- The management and control of quality -- Part Four. Management-level control -- Strategic performance measurement: Cost centers, profit centers, and the balanced scorecard -- Strategic performance measurement: Investment centers and transfer pricing -- Management compensation, business, analysis business valuation.

"We have written this book to help you understand the role of cost management in helping an organization succeed. Unlike many books that aim to teach you about accounting, we aim to show you how an important area of accounting, cost management, is used by managers to help organizations achieve their goals. An important aspect of cost management in our text is the strategic focus. By strategy, we mean the long-term plan the organization has developed to compete successfully. Most organizations strive to achieve a competitive edge through the execution of a specific strategy. For some firms, it is low cost; for others, it might be high quality, customer service, or some unique feature or attribute of its product or service. We know in these competitive times that an organization does not succeed by being ordinary. Rather, it develops a strategy that will set it apart from competitors and ensure its attractiveness to customers and other stakeholders into the future. The role of cost management is to help management of the organization attain and maintain success through strategy implementation. Thus, for every major topic covered in our text, there is a larger issue, which is: "How does this organization compete? What type of cost management information does it need?" We do not cover a cost management method simply to become proficient at it. We want you to know why, when, and how the technique can be used to help the organization succeed"-- Provided by publisher.