1. Objectives

The economic and productive output of any business entity or enterprise results from its use of resources
(such as labor, materials, services, facilities, patents and equipment) in seeking to achieve its strategic
purpose. These resources need to be acquired, financed and paid for. Many parties (such the
management team of the firm itself, its capital providers or shareholders, current and potential, its
customers and suppliers, the tax authorities, its workers’ unions, etc.) need to be informed about the
amounts of resources available, how they were financed or acquired and how effectively and efficiently
they are used to satisfy a market demand.

 Accounting is the descriptive language that addresses the needs of these users. It records all events
pertaining to acquiring, using or creating resources in an organization. In for-profit organizations,
creating more resources than are consumed, i.e. creating “profit”, is the immediate objective, while the
long term objective is to create a satisfactory return on capital employed. In a not-for-profit organization,
the overall objective may appear to be different but accounting rules and issues are the same
nonetheless, the definition of “resources created” and that of “capital employed” may be different, that is
all. This course will focus on for-profit organizations.

2. Description of the Module Contents

The course is an introduction to Financial Accounting & Reporting for business managers. The emphasis is
on using financial information for decision-making, not on the systems required to produce financial data.
The main purpose of this course is to deal with the measurement of “value created” and “value
consumed” (and the evaluation of the dynamics of value creation principally from the point of view of
outside decision-makers) and the use of financial accounting information by decision-makers.

The objectives of this module are to:
- Understand the quasi-universal principles and rules guiding the process of identifying,
accumulating, measuring, recording and structuring relevant economic information in the life of
a business entity (i.e. understand what financial statements reflect and how they are
interlinked).
- Appreciate the usefulness of accounting information for internal and external decision-makers.
- Understand the importance of financial statement analysis for managers, employees, customers
as well as suppliers, investors, financial analysts, strategy advisors and all stakeholders of the
business.
- Master the different “tools” used to analyze the financial situation of a business.

3. Faculty Biography

Michel J. LEBAS is Emeritus Professor of Management Accounting and Management
Control at the H.E.C. Graduate School of Management in Paris. He taught for 33
years in the H.E.C.-MBA program as well as in the H.E.C. Doctoral Program, and in
many senior executive programs for international firms on all five continents. He is
currently visiting professor at both the Foster School of Business of the University
of Washington and at the Fletcher School at Tufts University. He makes his home
in Seattle, Washington, USA.

He was educated both in France (H.E.C.) and in the United States (Tuck School at Dartmouth College and Stanford University Graduate School of Business.) After a brief career as an economic analyst for an American multinational firm in Boston and later as a staff consultant in the New York office of, then, Price-Waterhouse, he joined the academic profession in 1970 while maintaining a world-wide free-lance consulting practice.

His field of research and consulting concentrates on advanced practices in management accounting
and performance management systems. He is an Academic Research Associate in the “Beyond
Budgeting Round Table Program” of the Consortium for Advanced Manufacturing-International (CAMI);
he has represented, from July 1992 until July 2000, the French Accounting Profession (Ordre des
Experts Comptables and Compagnie des Commissaires aux Comptes) on the Financial and
Management Accounting Committee (FMAC) of the International Federation of Accountants (IFAC).
He is the founder, and was, from 1992 until 1996, co-editor, of the Management Accounting section of
the Revue Française de Comptabilité.

His publications include a recent, award winning, corporate financial reporting textbook (second
edition 2006), chapters in major international collective works, co-authorship of a Glossary of
Accounting English, co-authorship of a Management Accounting Glossary, as well as a management
accounting textbook. He co-authored a CAM-I monograph on Best Practices in World Class
Organizations with Ken Euske and C.J. McNair. His articles have been published in many academic
and professional journals including Administracion de Empresas (Argentina), Advances in Management
Accounting (US), Cahiers Français (F), De Accountant (NL), European Accounting Review (UK),
European Management Journal (UK), the Financial Times (UK), International Journal of Production
Economics (NL), Journal of Management Studies (UK), Les Echos (F), Management Accounting
Research(UK), Performances Humaines et Techniques (F), Problemi di Gestione (I), Revue Française
de Comptabilité (F), Revue Française de Gestion Industrielle (F), Sviluppo & Organizzazione (I) and
Travail (F).

Besides his current in-company management teaching and training activities, Professor Lebas
currently teaches executive education courses for the H.E.C. School of Management, the University of
Washington Foster School of Business, Tufts University, the Ecole Nationale des Ponts et Chaussées in
Paris, the South Mediterranean School of Business in Tunis, and the the Aarhus School of Business in
Denmark. He has been Associate Dean of Academic Affairs of the Ecole H.E.C. in France (1986-1989).
He has held visiting appointments at INSEAD (1983), SDA Bocconi in Milan (1990-1992), at the
Darden Graduate School of Business at the University of Virginia where he held the P&H Rust Chaired-
Professorship (1992-1993), at the University of Washington Foster School of Business where he held
the Hanson Endowment Chaired-Professorship (1999-2001).