Societal role expectations of management accounting professionals: an Australian study

Purpose: This paper seeks to advance the understanding of the relevance of management accounting (MA) as a profession by examining societal role expectations of MA professionals in Australia. Methodology/approach: The study presented in this paper is based on a questionnaire survey. Findings: Findings of the study show that Australian MA professionals are expected to have skills in cost management, corporate social responsibility, carbon accounting, risk management, business analysis, corporate governance, and asset valuations. The demand of MA professionals exceeded the pool of MA talents in Australia. The role expectations of MA professionals from different stakeholder groups are fairly consistent