使用交易成本理论解释会计外包【外文翻译】

使用交易成本理论解释会计外包【外文】 本科毕业(设计) 外 文 翻 译 原文: Using Transaction Cost Economics to explain outsourcing of accounting Outsourcing can be defined as the act of subcontracting out all or parts of some function in a firm to an external party. The transaction cost theory of the firm , introduced by Coase , has become a standard framework to explain why some firms choose to organize a given function internally, while other firms decide to outsource that function to an external party. An extensive part of the empirical research on outsourcing adopts this TCE frame work.By considering the relative cost of transactions using its own employees on the one hand and external parties on the other, TCE tries to explain how companies are organized. Simply stated , transactions differ in the degree to which relationship-specific assets are involved (asset specificity), the amount of uncertainty about the future (environmental uncertainty), the amount of uncertainty about other parties’ actions (behavior uncertainty), and the frequency with which a given transaction occurs. Many empirical studies have investigated the outsourcing of production tasks. Gatignon discuss several studies wherein the TCE framework is used to explain outsourcing of marketing and distribution tasks . Both asset specificity and behavioral uncertainty seemed significant in explaining entry mode (independent agent versus sales employees). With respect to the outsourcing of other service functions, such as human resources, IT, and accounting, only a few studies are available. For instance, Watjatrakul and Barthelemy found asset specificity to be an important driver for the outsourcing of IT.investigated the outsourcing of the internal audit function and found support for both asset specificity and frequency. As far as we know, research on the outsourcing of accounting using a TCE framework is missing. This limited number of studies on outsourcing of service functions is in contrast with the general trend we notice in practice, wherein companies tend to focus on core activities.derive from their review of the TCE literature that, despite the service-dominant shift in practice, limited attention has been given to the specific characteristics of service functions and their impact upon the outsourcing decision. They conclude that, to govern the outsourcing decision of business services efficiently, more emphasis should be placed on behavioral uncertainty, (human) asset specificity, and trust. Also, Klein concludes in his review paper that strategic management papers have included alternative theories of the firm, based on capabilities, power, and trust, and that these variables could potentially become important rivals to the transaction cost view. For instance, the impact of trust in service firms has been investigated by Brouthers , and trust turned out to be significant for entry mode choices in service firms (but not in manufacturing firms). Similarly, because of the people-intensive nature of the accounting tasks, we might expect that trust in the service provider will influence the outsourcing decision. Therefore, trust will be included in this paper. Furthermore, although small and medium-sized enterprises account for a significant portion of the economic activity, research on outsourcing within small and medium-sized enterprises (SME) is relatively scarce . have conducted research on the outsourcing of manufacturing tasks by small firms and have called for a more general theory of outsourcing, which would require the consideration of a number of personal and organizational drivers. Overall, the purpose of this study is to identify why some SMEs are outsourcing their accounting tasks, whereas other SMEs perform the same accounting tasks within the company. We will investigate the impact of TCE variables, while controlling for trust and other personal characteristics of the SME executive. In doing so, we attempt to expand the body of knowledge about outsourcing in several ways. First, we focus on outsourcing of a service function, conforming to the trends identified by Gilley et al.In that we focus, in depth, on one functional area, that being the accounting function. Second, we perform a cross-industry study within one country. the progression from single-industry case studies to a cross-industry within-country analysis is a natural one as we strive to further develop our knowledge on outsourcing. Third, hypotheses are derived from the TCE model and include asset specificity, environmental uncertainty, and frequency as explanatory variables. Klein argues that empirical research on outsourcing often is hampered by confusion about the definitions of, and therefore the empirical proxies for key variables like asset specificity and uncertainty. In this study, we do not use general proxies, but develop measurement scales to capture the perception of the SME executive on asset specificity, and environmental uncertainty. A measure for frequency is developed, capturing both the volume (representing the resources invested) and repetitiveness of the transaction. Fourth, we include control variables referring to the personal characteristics of the CEO (education, age, trust in the external accountant). Park and Krishnan suggest that personal variables may have an impact on outsourcing decisions, in particular for small firms. In addition, TCE has been criticized for being focused solely on opportunism as a basis for behavior, ignoring how relationships more often are based on cooperation and the personal relationships that exist between actors . Fifth, outsourcing often is modeled as a discrete variable. In this study, we consider the degree of outsourcing as the dependent variable since, particularly with accounting tasks, small firms often use a combination of outsourcing and internalizing. Finally, we collect data at the task level, thereby making it possible to distinguish between the outsourcing of routine and non-routine accounting tasks. In the following sections, we provide some background information and develop hypotheses by applying the TCE framework to accounting tasks. This is followed by a description of the survey methodology. Next, the findings are presented. Finally, the results are discussed and implications for future research are drawn. As we address the process of outsourcing, we refer to the ‘external accountant,’ including both the independent accountant and the accounting firm. As indicated in Fig. 1, the annual accounting process in a company is composed of four main tasks: (1) entry of invoices and financial transactions; (2) preparation of an interim profit and loss account ; (3) period end accounting ; (4) preparation of financial statements (balance sheets, profit and loss account, notes). These four tasks are interconnected, and all are necessary to produce complete financial statements. Similar to the internal auditing function, we may distinguish between routine and non-routine tasks. The entry of invoices and preparation of interim reports are routine tasks, whereas period end accounting and the preparation of financial statements can be considered non-routine tasks. Routine tasks are those tasks for which the output is relatively straightforward and standardized, which require less judgment on the part of the accountant, whether internal or external . In a similar vein, non-routine tasks require more judgment from the accountant, so that the decisions are less standardized and require valuable opinions. Since the accounting tasks are interconnected, the decision to outsource non-routine tasks depends, in a sense, on the outsourcing decision regarding routine tasks. For instance, firms that decide to fully outsource routine tasks also will need to rely on full outsourcing for non-routine tasks, since the firm will no longer possess the information that is required to perform the non-routine tasks internally. Additional accounting tasks (e.g., business advice to managers) have been excluded from this study, since these activities are performed on an ad special basis and significantly differ in terms of content. Exploratory interviews2 with practitioners have taught us that considering the accounting process simply in terms of outsourcing or internalizing will not capture reality. Some companies use a hybrid of outsourcing and internalizing, even within a single task. For instance, an internal accountant often prepares the period-end accounting, while the final touches on this task are outsourced to an external accountant. Hence, in this study, we consider outsourcing intensity to be the dependent variable and define it as ‘the degree of outsourcing, expressed as the percentage of the workload performed by an external accountant.’ Outsourcing intensity will be considered for the whole accounting process, the so-called overall outsourcing intensity, as well as for routine and non-routine tasks separately. Overall, the findings of this study demonstrate that the outsourcing of accounting in SMEs supports two major TCE predictions, i.e., for frequency and asset specificity. Frequency turns out to be significantly associated with the outsourcing intensity of both routine and non-routine accounting tasks. Consistent with the TCE model, the lower the frequency of the accounting tasks, the more intensely they are outsourced. SMEs seem to be able to create economies of scale for the routine accounting tasks that are recurrent and sizeable, so that they are inclined to maintain such accounting tasks internally. Furthermore, we found evidence for the important role of asset specificity, in particular for the non-routine tasks. Non-routine accounting tasks require more expertise and judgment from the accountant. When knowledge regarding the specific context of the company is important in making those judgments, it becomes costly to transfer them to an external accountant; hence, companies organize these accounting tasks internally. This result is consistent with previous research on the outsourcing of other service functions where human asset specificity is involved, Conversely, performing routine accounting tasks requires less judgment, since these tasks are more standardized across firms. For such tasks, frequency turns out to be a more important factor than asset specificity when making a decision on outsourcing. We found no support for a role of environmental or behavioral uncertainty.Outsourcing intensity of accounting tasks, whether routine or non-routine, is neither associated with the uncertainty of the workload of these accounting tasks nor with the extent to which it can be determined that the accountant has performed his/her job accurately. Similar to the outsourcing of internal audit activities, environmental uncertainty does not explain the outsourcing of accounting. Whether or not there is considerable variation in the workload, if the accounting services are not specific to the firm, they may be readily available from accounting firms, with little difference between spot and negotiated prices. If they are specific to the firm, tasks need to be done internally, irrespective of the fact that their scheduling is uncertain or not. Even though Vandaele et al. expect that behavioral uncertainty is an important factor in the outsourcing decision of service functions, the hypothesis regarding behavioral uncertainty was not supported by the data. The data show a rather low mean (both for routine and non-routine tasks), suggesting that it is not difficult to determine whether the accountant accurately performed the accounting tasks. Many software tools are available to check the accuracy of routine accounting tasks (input of data). In addition, legal offices (e.g., the National Bank, collector of financial statements) will alert management if the accountant has made a calculation error. TCE has been criticized for being focused solely on opportunism as the basis for behavior, ignoring how relationships are more often based on cooperation and the personal relationships that exist between actors than on actual or perceived self-serving . Therefore, this study also has incorporated the issue of trust. Considering the crucial role of the CEO as described by the ‘upper echelon perspective,’ trust in the service provider may be a unique characteristic of SMEs compared to larger firms . This study clearly shows that the SME’s decision to outsource accounting tasks is not only based on the characteristics of the transaction, but also is influenced by the interpersonal trust of the executive in the service provider . In addition, the crucial role of the personal characteristics of the CEO was further confirmed by the significant association between the educational background of the CEO and outsourcing. It was found that SMEs in which the CEO does not have an economic-oriented background tend to outsource their routine accounting tasks more intensely. Similarly, SMEs in which the CEO does not have a university degree are likely to outsource their non-routine accounting tasks more intensely. Since performing accounting tasks requires a minimum of accounting expertise, such CEOs may lack these relevant skills and knowledge, so that they choose to outsource. One may wish to extend this study’s findings to other service functions, such as human resources, IT, and legal support, wherein there are also both routine (e.g., recruitment, help desk, warranties) and non-routine tasks (e.g., remuneration policy, patent, court case). Frequently performed routine activities are candidates for internalizing. Similarly, non-routine tasks, requiring knowledge regarding firm-specific assets, particularly if performed on a frequent basis, will be retained within the firm. Furthermore, for accounting tasks, many firms use a combination of outsourcing and internalizing, even for individual tasks such as period end accounting. One might wonder whether this can be exclusively explained by transaction characteristics. The specific knowledge that is lacking in SMEs might be an alternative explanation . We hesitate to make predictions, but it seems that service functions that require specific knowledge are more heavily outsourced when the CEO does not possess the relevant knowledge from previous education. This conclusion is similar to the results obtained by Arnett and Jones , where the IT knowledge of the CEO was related to IT outsourcing. Source:Patricia Everaert,Gerrit Sarens,Jan Rommel,2010. “Using Transaction Cost Economics to explain outsourcing of accounting”. Small Bus Econ.July. pp. 93-112. 译文: 使用交易成本理论解释会计外包 外包被定义为企业将部分或全部功能分包给外方公司的一种模式。科斯提出，公司的交易成本理论已经成为一个的框架来解释为什么有些企业选择一个内部功能，而其他公司决定外包给外部的公司。关于外包的实证研究的一部分采用TCE 这种框架。TCE框架通过考虑交易成本试图解释公司是怎样组织公司的业务是使用内部功能还是进行外包。简单地说，在某种程度上交易不同，具体涉及到资产(资产特异性)，对未来的不确定性(环境的不确定性)，其他缔约方的行动的不确定性(行为不确定性)和一个给定的交易发生的频率。 许多实证研究外包的生产任务，研究讨论其中几个TCE框架来销售外包任务(所谓的前锋集成)，两资产专用性(人力资本)和行为不确定性的意义，解释似乎进入模式(独立的代理人与销售员工)。关于外包的其他服务功能,例如人力资源、信息技术，会计很少有研究是可以得到的。据我们所知，研究会计外包的使用TCE框架少之又少。 我们注意到服务外包的研究数量是有限的，在实践中，公司总的趋势是倾向于核心活动。来自TCE研究表明，虽然转移在实践中受到有限的关注，但是给了具体特征函数，所以能影响服务外包的决定。他们因此断定，大企业服务资源外包的效率决策更强调行为不确定性、(人)的资产专用性和信任。同时，克莱在他的文章结束时强调，战略管理文件包括替代理论的基础、公司能力与信任，这些 竞争对手比较交易成本的重要观点。例如，公司要依靠服务的影变量可能会变成 响，信任其实是进入选择模式的服务性企业(但不是制造公司)。同样的，因为帐目清算任务的性质，我们可以期望服务提供商会影响外包的决定。因此，信任将会列入介绍，而且，尽管中小企业的一个重要部分是经济活动，研究中小企业外包是相当匮乏的。研究小公司的生产任务外包将需要更多的理论，这将考虑到个 人和组织的时机。 整体而言，本研究的目的是为了确定为什么有些中小型企业会外包它们的会计工作，而其他的中小企业的会计任务不进行外包。我们将考察TCE在影响控制变量，信任和其他人格特征决定了中小企业主管。在这一过程中，我们试图扩大知识体中几个方面，首先，我们关注的是一种服务外包功能趋势，在一个功能区域我们深入集中精力，即会计功能;其次，我们在一个国家进行跨行业研究。从个案研究，跨行业的一个分析是我们进一步努力发展我们的知识资源外包等业务;第三，假设源自TCE模型，包括资产专用性、环境不确定性、频率作为解释变量。克莱恩认为，实证研究经常被外包的定义混淆，因此实证代表一些关键因素如资产特异性和不确定性。在本研究中，我们不要使用一般的代理，但中小企业资产专用性、环境的不确定性发展测量依比例决定。测量频率的开发，占领两个音量(代表)和投放的交易;第四，我们指的是包括对财务主管的个人特征控制变量(教育、年龄、倚靠外部会计)。个人变量可以影响外包的决定，尤其是小公司。此外，TCE一直被批评为是仅仅注重机会主义为基础的行为，忽略关系通常是如合作人与其中的演员之间存在着的人际关系;第五，外包经常进行变量离散。在本研究中，我们考虑外包作为因变量以来，特别会计工作，小公司经常使用组合外包。最后，我们总结收集的数据，分析任务可以区分为外包的常规会计工作和非常规的会计工作。 在接下来的段落里，我们提供了一些的背景信息并发展假说，运用会计TCE框架任务，继以描述一下这个调查。其次，进行结果介绍。最后，对调查结果进行了讨论和做出影响未来研究的结论。 当我们外包过程中，我们把独立公司以及会计公司的会计师比作血细胞。在图1所示的年度会计过程中，公司有四个主要任务:(1)发票和金融交易进入;(2)准备了临时损益账户;(3)期末会计;(4)编制财务报表(资产负债表、损益账户)。这四项工作都是相互联系相互制约的，组合成完整的财务报表。 内部审计功能，我们可以区分常规任务和非常规任务。输入的发票和准备临时报告是常规任务，而期末会计和财务报表之编制可以被认为是非常规任务。常规任务是一些工作相对简单和标准化的输出，这是要求越来越少的一部分，无论是会计内部和外部。在相同的条件中，非常规任务需要更多的会计判断，这样的 决定欠标准和宝贵意见。由于会计工作的外包决策常规任务的决定在某种意义上都是依赖于非常规任务外包，例如公司决定充分采纳外界的常规任务也将需要依靠非常规任务，因为企业将不再拥有的信息去执行非常规任务的内部。额外的会计任务(例如商业咨询管理)被该项研究结果排除，因为这些活动存在特殊的基础和显著的差异方面的内容。 从业人员告诉我们，要在会计处理上考虑到外包无法捕捉的现实。一些公司使用一种混合的外包，甚至在单一的任务也可以。例如一内部的会计师经常准备期末会计工作，而最后将这些任务外包给外部会计。因此，在本研究中，我们考虑外包强度作为因变量并定义其为“外包程度的百分数来表示工作量”。进行的外包的强度将被认为是对整个会计过程。对于整体外包强度，常规和非常规任务则另行规定。 总的来说，结果表明，中小企业的会计外包支持两种主要TCE的预测，即频率和资产的特殊性。频率是显著的正相关外包强度，包括日常会计工作。符合TCE模型，频率会降低会计工作，更需要的是要把他们外包出去的。中小企业可以创造经济规模相当大的常规会计任务，使他们倾向于保持这样的内部会计工作。此外，我们发现的证据证明了资产在专用性上起着重要的作用，尤其对于非常规的任务。非常规的帐目清算任务需要更多的专业知识去判断。对于特定环境的公司进行重要性地判断时，会计就会变得昂贵，因此公司通过这些内部的会计任务，把他们转移到外部会计。这个结果与以前的在外包其他服务的研究是一致的，具有资产专用性功能，与此有关的，例如内部审计、内部研发等。相反地，在公司里执行常规会计任务需要越来越少，因为这些工作都需要更规范。频率作为一个比资产专用性更为重要的因素时，才做出资源外包这样的业务的决定。 我们发现环境或行为不确定性的不支持作用。会计任务 的外包强度，无论常规或非常规，既不符合这些会计任务的工作量，也不符合不确定性的程度，这样它就可以被认定是会计师已精确完成他/她的工作。相似的外包例如内部审计活动，并不能解释环境不确定情况下的会计外包。如果对于这些不是特定服务会计的公司，那么工作量是否会有很大的变化，他们可以随时从会计师事务所去了解，了解价格有没有区别。如果他们在特定任务的公司，必须要做内部的任务，不论是不是这样一个事实:他们的调度是不确定的。行为不确定性是服务职能的 一个重要因素，资源外包的决策行为的不确定性假设不支持相关的数据。资料显示它(包括常规和非常规任务)并不难，相当低的程度决定是否准确地进行会计财务工作。许多软件工具可以提供检查精确的日常会计任务(输入的数据)。此外，如果在会计管理进行了计算误差，法律办公室(例如全国银行的财务报表)就会提醒。 TCE一直被批评是仅仅注重基础的机会主义行为，经常忽略如上下级工作人员之间的关系。因此，本研究也有研究信任方面的问。考虑到起关键作用的首席执行官，从他的角度描述，相信服务供应商是一个具有独特的特点的中小企业(与大公司的相比)。本研究清楚地说明了中小企业的决策表现的是会计工作的特点，在此基础上，企业间人际关系的信任程度影响服务提供商。此外，首席执行官的个人特征起着关键作用，进一步验证了首席执行官教育背景与外包业务有着重要联系。结果表明，中小企业的首席执行官在没有单一的日常外包背景下往往做会计工作更加放得开。同样，中小型企业不具备大学学历的首席执行官可能外包他们的非常规会计工作更加频繁。因此只有履行会计工作的学历的最低要求，这样的首席执行官可能缺乏这些相关的知识及技巧，使他们选择财务外包。 你可能会希望将这项研究的结果扩大到其他服务功能，例如:人力资源、信 包括常规功能(招聘、服务台、保证等)和非常规功能(息技术、法律，这些也报酬政策、专利、案件等)。经常执行例行任务者是内部的候选人。同样，对于非例行任务的人，需要懂得企业有关的特定的资产，特别是在很频繁执行的基础上，将留在这家公司。此外，对于会计工作，许多公司采用内部功能和一部分业务外包相结合，如会计期末。人们可能不知道通过交易的特点是否可以完全解释，中小企业缺乏特定的知识可能是另一种解释。我们毫不犹豫地作出预测，当公司财务主管不具备以前教育所必须的知识时，外包服务功能似乎更侧重特定知识的具备。这一结论与阿比和琼斯在资讯科技总裁知识与IT外包得到的结果相似。 出处:[美]帕特丽夏,盖瑞特,隆美尔.《使用交易成本理论解释会计外包》,小巴 士经济.第35卷,2010:93–112.