Copyright © 2015 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Decision Making and Relevant Information

Copyright © 2015 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Decision Makingand

Relevant Information


1. Use the five-step decision-making process2. Distinguish relevant from irrelevant

information in decision situations3. Explain the concept of opportunity cost

and why managers should consider it when making insourcing-versus-outsourcing decisions

4. Know how to choose which products to produce when there are capacity constraints

5. Explain how to manage bottlenecks

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6. Discuss the factors managers must consider when adding or dropping customers or business units

7. Explain why book value of equipment is irrelevant to managers making equipment-replacement decisions

8. Explain how conflicts can arise between the decision model a manager uses and the performance-evaluation model top management uses to evaluate managers

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Managers usually follow a decision model for choosing among different courses of action.

A decision model is a formal method of making a choice that often involves both quantitative and qualitative analyses.Management accountants analyze and present relevant data to guide managers’ decisions.Managers use the five-step decision-making process presented in Chapter 1 to make decisions.

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Relevant information has two characteristics: It occurs in the future It differs among the alternative courses of

action. Relevant costs are expected future

costs. Relevant revenues are expected future

Revenues. Past costs (historical costs) are never

relevant and are also called sunk costs.

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Quantitative factors are outcomes that can be measured in numerical terms.

Qualitative factors are outcomes that are difficult to measure accurately in numerical terms, such as satisfaction.Qualitative factors are just as important as

quantitative factors even though they are difficult to measure.

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Past (historical) costs may be helpful as a basis for making predictions. However, past costs themselves are always irrelevant when making decisions.

Different alternatives can be compared by examining differences in expected total future revenues and expected total future costs.

Not all expected future revenues and expected future costs are relevant. Expected future revenues and expected future costs that do not differ among alternatives are irrelevant and, hence can be eliminated from the analysis. The key question is always, What difference will an action make?

Appropriate weight must be given to qualitative factors and quantitative nonfinancial factors.

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Costs that have already occurred and cannot be changed are classified as sunk costs.

Sunk costs are excluded because they cannot be changed by future actions.

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Incremental cost—the additional total cost incurred for an activity.

Differential cost—the difference in total cost between two alternatives.

Incremental revenue—the additional total revenue from an activity.

Differential revenue—the difference in total revenue between two alternatives.

Note that incremental cost and differential cost are sometimes used interchangeably in practice.

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One-time-only special orders Short-run pricing decisions Insourcing vs. outsourcing (Make-or-Buy) Product-mix with capacity constraints

Bottlenecks, Theory of Constraints, and Throughput-Margin Analysis

Customer profitability and Relevant Costs Branch/segment: adding or discontinuing Equipment replacement

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Accepting or rejecting special orders when there is idle production capacity and the special orders have no long-run implications.

Decision rule: Does the special order generate additional operating income?Yes—acceptNo—reject

Compares relevant revenues and relevant costs to determine profitability.

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Managers should avoid two potential problems in relevant–cost analysis:

1.Avoid incorrect general assumptions such as that “All variable costs are relevant and all fixed costs are irrelevant.” Even in our simple example, we had irrelevant, variable marketing costs.

2.Be aware that unit-fixed-cost data can potentially mislead managers in two ways.(See next slide for details)

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Unit-fixed-cost data can be misleading in two ways:1.Fixed costs per unit may include costs that are irrelevant to a particular decision or may be irrelevant in total for a particular decision, and2.Unit fixed costs are accurate only for that particular level of output. For this reason, managers often use total fixed costs rather than per unit data especially when output levels are a variable for a particular decision.

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A special order decision is, in many respects, a short-run pricing decision. Sometimes, the decision is simply about setting an acceptable price. Remember the decision rule?Any price above incremental costs will improve operating income; however, consideration must be given to capacity constraints, current market conditions, customer demand, competition, etc.

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Outsourcing is purchasing goods and services from outside vendors.

Insourcing means you’ll produce the good (or provide the service) within the organization.

Decisions about whether to insource or outsource are called Make-or-Buy decisions.

Opportunity Costs are the contribution to operating income forgone by not using a limited resource in its next-best alternative use.

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Decision rule: Select the option that will provide the firm with the lowest cost, and therefore the highest profit.

Same as special order: choose the alternative that maximizes operating income.

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Opportunity Cost is the contribution to operating income forgone by not using a limited resource in its next-best alternative use.

Opportunity Costs are not recorded in financial accounting systems because historical record keeping is limited to transactions involving alternatives that managers actually selected rather than alternatives that they rejected.

One type of opportunity cost is the carrying cost of inventory: the operating income forgone by tying up money in inventory and not investing it elsewhere.

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Nonquantitative factors may be extremely important in an evaluation process for each of the decisions we cover here, yet do not show up directly in calculations: Quality requirements Reputation of outsourcer Employee morale Logistical considerations—distance from

plant, and so on For make/buy decisions, buying can be risky,

especially if sourcing internationally.

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Product-mix decisions are decisions managers make about which products to sell and in what quantities.Decision rule (with a constraint):

Choose the product that produces the highest contribution margin per unit of the constraining resource (not the highest contribution margin per unit of the product).

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Product A Product B

Selling Price $10.00 $30.00

Variable Cost per unit $ 6.00 $15.00

Contribution Margin/unit $ 4.00 $15.00

Contribution Margin percentage

40% 50%

Machine Hours Required per unit

0.5 3.0

Contribution Margin/machine hour

$ 8.00 $ 5.00

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CONCLUSION: Produce product A to maximize profitability.


A bottleneck is a phenomenon where the performance or capacity of an entire system is limited by a single or limited number of components or resources. The term bottleneck is taken from the 'assets are water' metaphor. As water is poured out of a bottle, the rate of outflow is limited by the width of the conduit of exit—that is, bottleneck. By increasing the width of the bottleneck one can increase the rate at which the water flows out of the neck at different frequencies. Such limiting components of a system are sometimes referred to as bottleneck points.

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The Theory of Constraints (TOC) describes methods to maximize operating income when faced with some bottleneck and some nonbottleneck operations. The TOC defines these three measures: Throughput margin Investments Operating costsThe objective of the TOC is to increase

throughput margin while decreasing investments and operating costs. The TOC focuses on managing bottleneck operations.

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Four steps to manage bottleneck operations:

1. Recognize that bottleneck operations determines the contribution margin of the entire system.

2. Identify the bottleneck operations. 3. Subordinate all nonbottleneck

operations to the bottleneck operation. 4. Take actions to increase the efficiency

and capacity of the bottleneck operation.

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When the cost object is a customer, managers must decide about adding or dropping the customer.

Decision rule: Does adding or dropping a customer add operating income to the firm?Yes—add or don’t dropNo—drop or don’t add

Decision is based on incremental income of the customer, not how much revenue a customer generates.

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Decision rule: Does adding or discontinuing a branch or segment add operating income to the firm?Yes—add or don’t discontinueNo—discontinue or don’t add

Decision is based on incremental income of the branch or segment, not how much revenue the branch or segment generates.

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Sometimes difficult due to amount of information at hand that is irrelevant:Cost, accumulated depreciation, and book

value of existing equipmentAny potential gain or loss on the transaction

—a financial accounting phenomenon only. Decision rule: Select the alternative that

will generate the highest operating income.

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Despite the quantitative nature of some aspects of decision making, not all managers will choose the best alternative for the firm.

Managers will consider how the company will judge his or her performance after the decision is implemented.

Many managers consider it unethical to take actions that make their own performance look good when these actions are not in the best interests of the firm.

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The decision model analysis (step 4) can dictate one decision but in the real world, would the manager want to follow it?

An important factor is the manager’s perception of whether the decision model is consistent with how the company will judge his or her performance after the decision is implemented (the performance evaluation model in step 5).

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TERMS TO LEARN PAGE NUMBER REFERENCE

Book value Page 448

Business function costs Page 429

Constraint Page 455

Decision model Page 425

Differential cost Page 433

Differential revenue Page 434

Full costs of the product Page 429

Incremental cost Page 433

Incremental revenue Page 434

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Insourcing Page 432

Linear programming (LP) Page 456

Make-or-buy decisions Page 432

Objective function Page 455

One-time-only special order Page 428

Opportunity cost Page 436

Outsourcing Page 432

Product-mix decisions Page 440

Qualitative factors Page 428

Quantitative factors Page 427

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Relevant costs Page 426

Relevant revenues Page 426

Sunk costs Page 427

Theory of constraints (TOC) Page 441

Throughput margin Page 441

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Copyright © 2015 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Decision Making and Relevant Information