SEMESTER: Spring 2020

COURSE NUMBER: EWMBA 224A.1

This course is cross-listed with the Full-Time MBA Program.

COURSE TITLE: Managerial Accounting

UNITS OF CREDIT: 2 Units

CLASS MEETING DATES: Thursday evening 6pm-9:30pm

INSTRUCTOR: John Briginshaw

E-MAIL ADDRESS: john.briginshaw@berkeley.edu

PREREQUISITE(S): EWMBA core curriculum

CLASS FORMAT: Lectures, cases and a project

REQUIRED READINGS: Textbook (Accounting for Decision Making and Control (9^th edition) by Jerold Zimmerman), cases.

BASIS FOR FINAL GRADE:

Class/Case Participation: 20%

Problem sets: 20%

Case write-ups (group work): 10%

Project (applying the course to student's current job): 10%

Midterm: 10%

Final: 30%

All exams allow crib sheet.

CAREER FIELD:

Managerial Accounting is useful for careers in both consulting, corporate finance and general management. An understanding of how costs are calculated is important for anyone who has or may take on profit responsibility for goods or services, especially in organizations with a variety of products.

ABSTRACT OF COURSE'S CONTENT AND OBJECTIVES:

A more descriptive title for the course would be "Accounting for Decision-making and Control." This course is concerned with how a manager uses accounting information within his or her organization. The aim is to help managers understand the information they are getting and its limitations, and how to get better information and/or better metrics to inform their decisions.

Topics include

· Break even analysis and business viability

· Decision making using incremental costs

· Activity based costing for pricing products

· Budgeting and its limitations

· Division evaluation including transfer pricing

· Personal evaluation including performance related pay

Cases include

1. Old Turkey Mash – how changes in book-keeping can affect profitability of whole company

2. SnapOn Fasteners – how allocation of costs can risk giving wrong signals of which product line to emphasize

3. Executive Inn – effect of compensation on manager’s decision making

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH:

John Briginshaw graduated in Chemistry before working in commodity trading, then took an MBA at London Business School. Post MBA he worked in management consulting before gaining a PhD at Berkeley. Post PhD he has taught at Pepperdine and UC Berkeley. He gained club 6 ratings for MBA224A Management Accounting in Spring 2016 and MBA222 Financial Information Analysis in Spring 2014, as well as in several undergrad and law school courses.