An explanatory model of managers' information needs: implications for management accounting

Abstract

This paper focuses on managers' need for information for managerial purposes and examines their degree of satisfaction and perception of missing information. Data for this paper were collected from 120 interviews with managers from eleven major French companies. This paper seeks to target the factors determining managers' needs. We consequently developed a model that examines how manager-based variables (function, career path, objectives pursued) and company-based variables (performance, private sector or public sector status) determine managers' needs. The model also takes into account managers' individual strategies in selecting and using information. Based on this model we suggest exploring three roads forward, each of which could eventually lead to an improvement in managers' satisfaction with the management accounting information that they receive.