Assignment Task

1) Group Report.

2) Student learning outcome

By successfully completing this assessment tasks students should be able to demonstrate:

(a) Use management accounting approaches to describe and describe cost management and the effect of costs on product profitability

(b) Understand financial performance measures, pricing and product mix decisions and how we as Management Accountants can add value to Customers and Shareholders.

(c) Understand contemporary approaches to measuring and rewarding performance (If appropriate to selected case.)
 
3) Student assessment:

You are  to find  two  companies  in the same  industry  (e.g. Two grocery retailers, or two Transport Companies)  to study. This will require you to investigate  these businesses and (to a lesser extent) the  industry  in which they operate. The focus is  NOT  on purely financial performance but rather on HOW  these companies have been overhauling its management of the Supply Chain to add both Customer and Shareholder Value.
 
Note that you should FOCUS on ONE company and use the alternate company (more than one if you wish) for comparison purposes.
 
You can research the exs given in Chapter 15 of the Text (6e p.685 Regarding Roberts Wool Link and The Merino Company. or 6e pp.686-687 Sigma and Blue Circle: A Supply Chain Partnership as exs of how you could START your report and the type of companies you could examine.)
 
Students are to work in a GROUP  and produce a report (minimum 2800 words) on how the companies you have chosen has worked on its supply chain (relationships between itself and its suppliers and customers) to add value to the firm and to maximise that value due to the relationships it has created.
 
The Report will require that you use Microsoft Word to format and complete the task.

There are TWO steps to submitting your assignment:

a)  The Group Report is to be submitted using Turnitin EARLY to obtain a Turnitin Score. Once you have your score. The Turnitin Score MUST be less than 40% unless agreed in writing from the Lecturer. Please note that a second submission to Turnitin can take up to 24 hours to return so allow PLENTY of time if you think you may get close to or greater than a 40% Turnitin Score.

b)  Once your Report is at LESS THAN 40% Turnitin Score, then you are to submit the Group Report to the MOODLE ASSIGNMENT. The Markers will check BOTH mark the Turnitin Assignment however the marks will be put against your Moodle Assignment submission.

(This is to allow for Group Marks to be awarded which is only available for Moodle Assignments, NOT Turnitin Assignments.)

NOTE: The Moodle Assignment allows up the three (3) separate files to be submitted. This will allow students to submit additional material such as Company Report Extracts or other Excel Files that may support the findings of your Group. Please make a note of this in your assignment if you wish the marker to refer to these additional materials. It is NOT the intention to have students submit three ‘versions’ of their reports! You may find, by including additional (fully referenced) materials that you can lower your Turnitin Score as you will not have to include referenced material within the Report which would otherwise
appear to be plagiarised.

Final due time and date is before 11.55 PM Monday 16 September 2013 (Moodle due time will be set to 11.55pm.) This date is in the BEGINNING of Week 9. (Please consult the Library for instructions if necessary WELL BEFORE the due date and time.) A printed copy of the assignment should be handed in during your tutorial in Week 9 however the time of electronic submission to Turnitin/Moodle will be the time officially recorded as your lodgement time. Naturally you may lodge it earlier if desired.

The students MUST accompany their printed copy of the assignment submission with a completed and signed KOI Group Assignment Coversheet. Please note that marks will be awarded to all members of the group based on their input. The lecturer should be consulted if a group member is not contributing to the task WELL IN ADVANCE of the due date so action may be taken.

Only ONE person in the GROUP (someone very reliable) should be nominated to make the GROUP lodgement. Do NOT lodge multiple copies of the GROUP assignment from each group member. More information will be provided in Week 8 on how this can be done.

4) Assignment and Research hints:

How do you measure Customer and Shareholder value?

Review more than just profitability as an absolute measure of ‘success’ (e.g. Telstra is by far the biggest telephony company but it does not automatically mean the ‘best’.). Other non-financial indicators may include such things as ‘growth in market share’ (e.g. Growth of Market Share of the Grocery Market for Coles over the past 5 years), ‘market leadership’, growth of a particular business segment (e.g. share of business class passengers for an airline.). Reading Financial Press articles (rather than simply consulting the Company’s own website) will often give you a very good indication of how well the business is being managed.
 
Other key features of a well-run company is often such things as stability of senior management, the accolades (awards and acknowledgements) that the CEO and other senior managers may be given in the press for their leadership skills and innovative thinking. (Note you definitely SHOULD know the CEO’s name and how long they have been at the Company.)
 
Where to find information:

Remember, you are looking for additional academic articles and information to support your Report relating to “Supply Chain Reform” in an AUSTRALIAN Company or Industry. Also you should try to get current articles, so you should try to find articles written between 2005 and 2013. Earlier articles may be OK but you need to think as to whether they are still relevant given today’s circumstances.
 
Finding articles:

1. Type the term into the Library database

2. Add a second search term such as marketing or consumer if you don’t get any results first

3. Still no results that you can use? Try to use a different term that means the same thing.