PACE Academic IG

Had a few interesting conversations in recent months about what minors are best for students majoring in accounting. Not too long ago many would recommend doubling-down on the quantitative business aspect with finance as a minor or double major. More recently, I've seen and heard advice that the better route is a different but complementary field. Maybe Sales/Marketing if you're going more public accounting. Certainly computer science or a data science type field where you build stronger analytical skills and gain experience with coding and working with larger data sets. Maybe something with a stronger operational focus like supply chain. Or maybe something further afield like a fine arts discipline to get stronger in things like storytelling and communication.

What say you?

Saw that apparently Excel is integrating Python into it. Any ideas what you might do with this. I'm excited.

I've developed a course that is basically (what I would consider) FP&A aspects of management accounting: budgeting, pricing, theory of constraints, variance analysis, transfer pricing, responsibility centers, balanced scorecard, etc. I also include a substantial discussion of the management control aspects of most every topic. Would you consider such a course to be, essentially, what elsewhere might be considered "Controllership"?

Thinking about some of the topics, especially management control systems and things like the balanced scorecard, do you think we integrate those enough into the broader work of PACE?

Have been contemplating a bit recently the importance of benchmarking in cost and management accounting. Most texts do mention it, but it seems to me that the inclusion is almost a side bar, kind of in passing. The more I explore the topic, the more I do think it should be a more prominent part of our discipline. What say you?