The major task that you need to complete in this subject is the preparation of a report which provides an assessment of a client's need for strategic management information and then provides a solution to that need.
The report will be broken up into 4 parts:
1) Introduction (Part 1)
2) Literature review and the methodology
You will need to find a client and if you are working it could be your employer or some other business that you have identified. After some discussion with the client identify some information that the client does not have that has strategic importance and develop that information for the client. You will be expected to draw on the knowledge and skills that you have gained in Accounting 1 and 2, in Management Accounting 1 and Accounting Systems and also in this subject to complete the report. Examples of activities that you could undertake and report on are a budget, an ABC analysis of some portion of a business, preparation of some Balanced Scorecard strategy maps for the business or complete a customer analysis.
For example your client may be a farm whose vision is 'to sustainably grow and sell the best'. The farm is seeking a competitive advantage through product differentiation but still needs to have a strong understanding of costs, budgets and markets in order to time sales to maximise the quality of its product. If the farm has to sell the product early to generate cash flow then it is not achieving its vision. The client, i.e. the farm needs a detailed cash budget to help it achieve that vision and this is the solution that you could provide.
Client confidentiality needs to be respected throughout this project. You must include a statement in your own words that guarantees the confidentiality of any information you gather from the organisation, through observation, experience or conversation in any ACC311 assessment and that identities of the participants, the organisation, its associates and staff are rendered anonymous. You must also attach the signed consent form for participants with this assessment. A copy of the form is to be found in the Resources section of Interact.
You may choose to work on this report in a team of no more than 3 people or you may complete the report as an individual. If you choose to work on this in a team please list the team members when you submit each part of the report. The report will be submitted in 4 parts over the session. Please read the instructions for all the parts of the report so that you get a complete understanding of the task before you start working on Part 1.
Requirement
Part 1 of the report is the Introduction. This should include a pseudonym (remember that we are respecting the confidentiality of the business) for the business, the market and context in which the business operates, and the business' vision for itself. You will also need to identify the strategic management information that you will provide the business and how this information will improve the business' strategic planning.
Rationale
This assignment is designed to demonstrate your ability to:
• use strategic management principles and technologies in making and assessing business decisions for profit and not for profit organisations;
• generate, evaluate and use quantitative and qualitative information to measure financial and non financial performance of an organisation;
• generate, evaluate and use information for planning and controlling operations within an organisation;
• develop and evaluate computer spreadsheet models.