Management Accountants' Changing Identities and Roles
- Authors
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Julian Hayes
Author
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- Keywords:
- management accountant; identity changing; strategic insights; decision support;
- Abstract
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Over the past two decades, the role of the management accountant has been the subject of intensifying academic and practitioner scrutiny. Once largely defined by cost accounting, budgetary control, and historical scorekeeping, management accounting is now expected to deliver strategic insight, real-time decision support, and forward-looking analysis. This paper composes a structured review of the literature on the changing identities and roles of management accountants, drawing systematic attention to the external, organizational and individual drivers of transformation. We examine the established dichotomy between the traditional "bean counter" and the modern "business partner," argue that this binary framing is increasingly misleading, and explore how digitalization, sustainability imperatives, and demographic change further complicate identity reconstruction. Findings indicate that MAs' identities are fragmented, fluid, and contested, and that any movement from one fixed identity to another oversimplifies the lived reality of contemporary professionals. Implications for research, practice and education are discussed.
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- Published
- 2026-04-30
- Issue
- Vol. 11 No. 3 (2026)
- Section
- Articles
- License
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Copyright (c) 2026 Review of Economic & Managerial Studies
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