تاثیر قصد رفتاری عوامل تغییر بر استفاده از هزینه یابی بر مبنای فعالیت / سیستم های مدیریت و عملکرد شرکت : دیدگاه تئوری واحد و یکپارچه ی پذیرش و استفاده از تکنولوژی

This study adopts the viewpoint of the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) model to examine the change agents' behavioral intentions in the implementation of an activity based costing/management (ABC/M) system. ABC/M is an important management system that emphasizes the allocation of overhead costs on the basis of cost drivers, in order to provide relevant information for improved decision-making. A change agent is a person chosen to cause organizational change. Senior managers and often chief executives usually play the role that implements change. The behavioral intentions have been identified as a proactive attitude and action for promoting the ABC/M system in this study. Since there is little evidence of ABC/M adoption outside the United States and European countries, this research used Taiwanese companies as the sample. Questionnaires were used to investigate the factors influencing change agents' behavioral intentions to promote ABC/M systems and the type of facilitating conditions that affected the extent of usage of ABC/M systems. The questionnaires were carried out through the perspective of user acceptance of information technology (IT). Furthermore, the aim of this paper is also to explore whether use of the ABC/M system will produce an improved effect on performance. The empirical results from 100 valid responses collected indicate that performance expectancy and social influence directly affect change agents' behavioral intentions. Both change agents' behavioral intentions and facilitation conditions are important constructs that affect the extent of usage of ABC/M systems. The extent of ABC/M usage is also significantly associated with relative financial and non-financial performance. The results demonstrate that the adaptive UTAUT model is applicable for measuring change agents' behavioral intentions in current implementations of ABC/M systems. The study also reveals the positive effect of change agents on the performance of ABC/M systems.

Several recent studies have begun to consider the constructs related to ABC/M implementation and its success (Anderson, 1995, Anderson & Young, 1999, Brown et al., 2004 and Foster & Swenson, 1997; Gosselin, 1997; Shields, 1995 and Swenson, 1995). Studies of this stream identified contextual, behavioral, organizational, environmental, and other constructs associated with the implementation process that affect the adoption of ABC/M systems. However, very limited studies have defined constructs that examined the adaptation of ABC/M projects from the perspective of information systems. As claimed by Gupta, and Galloway (2003), ABC/M is an “Information System” (IS) developed to overcome some limitations that exist in traditional cost accounting and to enhance its usefulness to the strategic decision-making processes. Moreover, as Kaplan, and Cooper (1998) suggested, “The ABC systems usually reside on personal computers or PC network, and depend on the data downloaded from networks or floppies”. Since ABC/M systems are regarded as one type of IS, it is worthwhile to research the adoption of ABC/M from the perspective of IT. Explaining user acceptance of information technology (IT) is often described as one of the most researched areas in contemporary information literature (Hu, Chau, Sheng, & Tam, 1999). Since user acceptance of an information technology is the key to implementation of information systems, it is vital to research the users' acceptance of IT, like ABC/M systems. Moreover, the critical role of change agents in ABC/M implementation has been suggested in several studies (Cooper et al., 1992, Foster & Swenson, 1997, Shields, 1995 and Lin & Duh, 2003). Nevertheless, how IS/IT-related determinants affect change agents' behavioral intentions remains unexplored. Thus, the first aim of this study focuses on how IS/IT-related determinants affect change agents' behavioral intentions for ABC/M systems. Kennedy, and Affleck-Graves (2001) demonstrated that ABC/M could improve financial performance by using a binary variable to differentiate the firms that were adopting ABC/M. Nonetheless, prior studies suggested that the implementation of ABC/M should be measured by employing the extent of usage of ABC/M instead of utilizing a binary variable (Gosselin, 1997, Cagwin & Bouwman, 2002 and Baird et al., 2004). To avoid the problem that survey respondents may misinterpret the definition of ABC/M implementation, Cagwin, and Bouwman (2002) argued that there would exist a positive relationship between “the extent of usage of ABC/M” and “relative improvement in financial performance.” Still, limited empirical research has proved that the extent of usage of ABC/M can benefit firms. Therefore, the second aim of this study is to investigate how change agents' behavioral intentions to promote ABC/M influences the extent of usage of ABC/M, and the relationship between the extent of usage of ABC/M systems and relative performance improvement. This paper contributes to existing literature on the adoption of ABC/M in two ways. First, the contribution of this research is to propose a theoretic framework for management accounting innovations from the perspective of IT acceptance. Second, this study points out the importance of IS/IT-related constructs and the relative performance improvement associated with the adoption and implementation of ABC/M.

This study examines constructs which influence change agents' behavioral intentions to promote ABC/M systems, and how change agents' behavioral intentions and facilitating conditions affect the extent of usage of ABC/M systems by integrating prior literature and research in the areas of management accounting and management information systems. The authors also investigate the relationship between the extent of usage of ABC/M systems and relative performance improvement. The results indicate that performance expectancy and social influence all have a significant positive impact on change agents' intentions to promote ABC/M systems. Further, this study found that change agents' intentions to promote ABC/M systems and facilitating conditions are two significant determinants of the extent of usage of ABC/M systems, and the positive association between the extent of usage of ABC/M systems and relative performance improvement. An important contribution of this study is that it found two significant determinants of the extent of usage of ABC/M systems from the perspective of user acceptance of IT, and change agents' behavioral intentions and facilitating conditions. Accordingly, this research study could be used to increase the adoption rate of ABC/M systems from these two viewpoints. Further, performance expectancy and social influence both have a significant effect on change agents' intentions, thus implying that presidents and/or senior managers who want to adopt ABC/M systems should try to increase CFOs' behavioral intentions by including performance expectancy and social influence. The linkage between the extent of usage of ABC/M and relative performance improvement could encourage CEOs and CFOs to adopt ABC/M systems. Moreover, relative performance improvement is not restricted to financial improvement; non-financial performance is considered as well. The authors can try to solve the research paradox of ABC/M from the empirical evidence found in this study. The current study has the following limitations. First, the limited sample size prohibited the authors from obtaining generality of this research, producing a good fit of the research model, and classifying the firms in a detailed manner. Second, the sample in the current study was deliberately selected from public and “superior performing” companies in Taiwan. This fact may create biases in this study's results in that the extent of usage of ABC/M systems may have been inflated. Another possible bias is that the questionnaire data was collected from one change agent's opinion, while multiple questionnaire respondents may have provided more reliable measurement. Future research can collect multiple respondents for the variables identified in this questionnaire as being important. Finally, more than 70% of firms in the sample of this study are manufacturing firms; therefore, the findings from this study may only be applicable for manufacturing firms. This study has several implications for researchers. First, future research can be focused on exploring constructs which influence the adoption of ABC/M systems from the perspective of IT. This study proposes one theoretic framework for future research of management accounting innovations in which IT plays an important role. For practitioners, this study points out several determinants that influence change agents' intentions and the extent of usage of ABC/M systems. Thus, change agents and CEOs should emphasize performance expectancy, social influence, and facilitating conditions when adopting or trying to adopt ABC/M systems. Moreover, relative performance improvement, which is strongly related to the extent of usage of ABC/M systems, can certainly encourage firms to adopt ABC/M systems.