RELATE MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING RESEARCH TO MANAGERIAL WORK

This article argues that management accounting research should be more aligned with managerial work. Managers work with words. This means th at managerial conversation and the use of accounting information in su ch conversation should be studied. Methodology is developing rapidly i n other areas of social science where a ''linguistic turn'' has made a n impact. Managerial work, characterised by ''brevity, variety, and fr agmentation,'' provides the context in which accounting information is used. Management is thus described as a co-operative game where commu nication is central to attention direction as well as problem solving. An illustration is given of the kind of studies deemed necessary for management accounting research to progress towards managerial relevanc e. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.