Marc Wouters

2015

This paper describes the results of an interventionist research, which investigated the use of accounting information by project managers at cross-functional development projects in an automotive supplier company. With the rapid growth of the company in the last two decades, the complexity of the projects considerably increased. The reports, however, did not present the transparency and reliability demanded by project managers in the company to track the costs of their projects. Despite a clear perception of the problem by some stakeholders, the organization was not able implement an adequate solution inside its routine. This study, through a focused work on the problem, intends to answer empirically, why companies fail to implement mechanisms to supply managers with enabling accounting information. The results suggest that lacking interdepartmental collaboration and fragmented knowledge are the major hurdles preventing companies to implement satisfactory systems to all projects’ stakeholders. To develop a solution, knowledge and sets of interests mainly from IT, accountants and project managers were gathered and regarded. This research, tries to mediate those interests and propose a solution to the company, by using IT resources to increase the level of integration between projects stakeholders.