Accountants, from Tradition to Transition:the Impact of Enterprise Resource Planning Systems

This paper aims at examining how the adoption of a new Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system challenges the definition of the expertise and roles of accountants within organisations. By drawing on structuration theory, as we rely on the notion of duality of structure for insights into the processes by which new accountants’ practices and positions emerge, we indicate that the three levels (action, modalities of structuration, structure) and the three dimensions of structuration (signification, legitimation, domination) are a fundamental analytical device to understand such transformation. Within the outlined framework, we propose to conceptualise the potential change in accountants' expertise as a structuration process and ERP systems as modalities of structuration providing new interpretive schemes, norms and co-ordination and control facilities. Finally, since we are convinced that detailed interpretive case studies of ERP implementations are needed to understand their complex impact on accountants’ positions and practices, we provide one such study as the basis for the development of some general conclusions deriving from our research. Key-words: ERP systems, accountants, change, structuration, interpretive case study JEL Codes: M4, O33 Submitted to: The European Accounting Review. (*) ARIELA CAGLIO. Lecturer in Management Accounting at L. Bocconi University, Professor within the Accounting and Management Control Department of SDA Bocconi-Bocconi University School of Management, via Bocconi 8 -20136 Milan (Italy) Tel: +39025836.6401/2575 Fax: +39 02 836.6890/2561 [email protected]