Your business has been open for a month, and you have prepared an income statement and completed a variance analysis on the data. Now you will meet with investors and a few other internal stakeholders to share

ACC 202 Project Guidelines and Rubric

Competencies

In this project, you will demonstrate your mastery of the following competencies:

• Describe how managerial accounting supports management information systems
• Utilize managerial accounting techniques and models to support an organization’s strategic plan
• Explain how managerial accounting is used to make decisions about short-term business opportunities, capital investments, and evaluating operational performance

Scenario

Your business has been open for a month, and you have prepared an income statement and completed a variance analysis on the data. Now you will meet with investors and a few other internal stakeholders to share your company’s progress over the past month. You will explain how it has performed compared with your cost and budget projections. The investors would like to see the thought process behind your financial strategy and how your company has performed in its first month. They have asked you to present a report that includes the cost and income data from your Project Workbook.

Directions

Submit a detailed report to your potential investors and other stakeholders to explain and defend your costing strategies and to share your business’s performance to date. Your report can be in the form of a Microsoft PowerPoint presentation or a Microsoft Word document. Refer to the templates linked in the What to Submit section below. In either format, be certain to effectively communicate with your stakeholders by breaking down concepts and using investor-friendly language to build their trust and confidence. If you choose to do a Microsoft PowerPoint presentation, include speaker notes for each slide.

Note: This will be the same business that you worked on in Milestones One, Two, and Three.

1. Introduction: Provide a short overview of your company and the purpose of this report.
   1. Business Overview: Include the business name and describe its business and your vision for its future.
   2. Purpose of the Report: Explain the purpose of the report and describe why the accounting information is important.
   3. Methods and Approach: Explain the management accounting methods you used for generating the information that you are about to share in terms of your adherence to industry standards and the AICPA and CIMA (Association of International Certified Professional Accountants) code of ethics.
2. Financial Strategy: Review your original business plan and costing strategies.
   1. Costing System: Justify the use of job order costing for this business. Compare and contrast the various costing systems you learned about in this course as part of your defense.
   2. Selling Prices: Share and explain the selling prices you established for each of your products. Reference your cost-volume-profit analysis in your defense.
   3. Contribution Margin: Share and explain your contribution margin per unit. Reference your cost-volume-profit analysis in your defense.
   4. Target Profits: Identify your break-even points for achieving different target profits. Then explain the target profits you selected for each area of your business. Reference your cost-volume-profit analysis in your defense.
3. Financial Statements: Using the information in the Milestone Two Market Research Data Appendix, which is linked in the Supporting Materials section, assess your financial performance to date.
   1. Statement of Cost of Goods Sold: Share the statement of cost of goods sold and logically interpret the business’s performance against the benchmarks provided.
   2. Income Statement: Share the income statement and logically interpret the business’s performance against the benchmarks provided.
   3. Variances: Illustrate all variances for the direct labor time and the materials price.
   4. Significance of Variances: Evaluate the significance of the variances in terms of the potential to impact future budgeting decisions and planning.

What to Submit

To complete this project, you must submit one of the following templates:

Investor Report PowerPoint Template
Use this template to submit a Microsoft PowerPoint presentation with speaker notes. Replace the bracketed text with your information. Sources should be cited according to APA style.

or

Investor Report Word Template
Use this template to submit an 8- to 10-page Microsoft Word document. Replace the bracketed text with your information. Sources should be cited according to APA style.

Supporting Materials

The following resource may help support your work on the project:

Reading: Milestone Two Market Research Data Appendix

Project Rubric

CriteriaExceeds Expectations (100%)Meets Expectations (85%)Partially Meets Expectations (55%)Does Not Meet Expectations (0%)ValueIntroduction: Business OverviewExceeds expectations in an exceptionally clear, insightful, sophisticated, or creative mannerIncludes the business name and describes its business and visionShows progress toward meeting expectations, but with errors or omissions; areas for improvement may include describing the business or its visionDoes not attempt criterion5Introduction: Purpose of the ReportExceeds expectations in an exceptionally clear, insightful, sophisticated, or creative mannerExplains the purpose of the report and describes why the accounting information is importantShows progress toward meeting expectations, but with errors or omissions; areas for improvement may include describing why the accounting information is importantDoes not attempt criterion5Introduction: Methods and ApproachExceeds expectations in an exceptionally clear, insightful, sophisticated, or creative mannerExplains management accounting methods for generating information, and explains them in terms of adherence to industry standards and the AICPA and CIMA code of ethicsShows progress toward meeting expectations, but with errors or omissions; areas for improvement may include providing adequate details regarding adherence to the industry standards or AICPA and CIMA code of ethicsDoes not attempt criterion10Financial Strategy: Costing SystemExceeds expectations in an exceptionally clear, insightful, sophisticated, or creative mannerJustifies the use of job order costing for this business; compares and contrasts the various costing systems as part of the defenseShows progress toward meeting expectations, but with errors or omissions; areas for improvement may include comparing various costing systems to defend the use of job order costingDoes not attempt criterion10Financial Strategy: Selling PricesExceeds expectations in an exceptionally clear, insightful, sophisticated, or creative mannerShares and explains the established selling prices; references the cost-volume-profit analysis as part of the defenseShows progress toward meeting expectations, but with errors or omissions; areas for improvement may include using the cost-volume-profit analysis to explain the established selling pricesDoes not attempt criterion10Financial Strategy: Contribution MarginExceeds expectations in an exceptionally clear, insightful, sophisticated, or creative mannerShares and explains the chosen contribution margin per unit; references cost-volume-profit analysis as part of the defenseShows progress toward meeting expectations, but with errors or omissions; areas for improvement may include explaining the contribution margin using the cost-volume-profit analysisDoes not attempt criterion10Financial Strategy: Target ProfitsExceeds expectations in an exceptionally clear, insightful, sophisticated, or creative mannerIdentifies break-even points for achieving target profits; explains selected target profits for each area of the business; references the cost-volume-profit analysis as part of the defenseShows progress toward meeting expectations, but with errors or omissions; areas for improvement may include adequately describing the selected target profits; using the cost-volume-profit analysisDoes not attempt criterion10Financial Statements: Statement of Cost of Goods SoldExceeds expectations in an exceptionally clear, insightful, sophisticated, or creative mannerShares the statement of cost of goods sold and logically interprets the business’s performance against the benchmarks providedShows progress toward meeting expectations, but with errors or omissions; areas for improvement may include correctly interpreting the business’s performance based on the actual cost of goods soldDoes not attempt criterion10Financial Statements: Income StatementExceeds expectations in an exceptionally clear, insightful, sophisticated, or creative mannerShares the income statement and logically interprets the business’s performance against the benchmarks providedShows progress toward meeting expectations, but with errors or omissions; areas for improvement may include correctly and logically interpreting the income statementDoes not attempt criterion10Financial Statements: VariancesExceeds expectations in an exceptionally clear, insightful, sophisticated, or creative mannerIllustrates all variances for the direct labor time and the materials priceShows progress toward meeting expectations, but with errors or omissions; areas for improvement may include identifying and sharing all variancesDoes not attempt criterion5Financial Statements: Significance of VariancesExceeds expectations in an exceptionally clear, insightful, sophisticated, or creative mannerEvaluates the significance of the variances in terms of the potential to impact future budgeting decisions and planning correctlyShows progress toward meeting expectations, but with errors or omissions; areas for improvement may include correctly evaluating the significance and explaining how it impacts future planningDoes not attempt criterion10Clear CommunicationExceeds expectations with an intentional use of language that promotes a thorough understandingConsistently and effectively communicates in an organized way to a specific audienceShows progress toward meeting expectations, but communication is inconsistent or ineffective in a way that negatively impacts understandingShows no evidence of consistent, effective, or organized communication