Editor's Letter
By Kathy Williams

Aligning the Balanced Scorecard and a Firm's Strategy Using the Analytic Hierarchy Process
By DeWayne L. Searcy, Ph.D., CPA, CMA, CIA
This article examines how the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) was used to provide insights to six lean manufacturing companies about the degree of alignment between the balanced scorecard and their strategic initiative of implementing lean. It also provides a step-by-step process for using Excel in AHP applications.

Strategic Alignment and Systems Control of Processes: The Case of JEA
By John B. MacArthur, Ph.D.; Mike J. Brost, P.E.; and Bruce Doueck
The authors describe how JEA, a municipal utility in Jacksonville, Fla., implemented a process-based organizational structure and supporting cost management and other models, which include Process-Based Costing (PBC). JEA's general strategic control approach is a paradigm that can be adapted to other types of organizations.

Russian Management Training Programs: Do Corporate Responsibility Topics Have a Place?
By David S. Harrison and Patsy G. Lewellyn
Significant changes in education in the former Soviet Union have focused on training in the areas of management, marketing, and finance but not corporate responsibility. The authors believe now is the most critical time to build ethical commitments into the new economic and business culture. They discuss the potential cultural receptiveness of Russians to these issues, provide some basics on corporate responsibility and stakeholder theory, and recommend course curricula, for which the provide an outline.

How Corporate Culture Impacts Unethical Distortion of Financial Numbers
By Joseph F. Castellano, Ph.D.; Kenneth R. Rosenzweig, CMA, CPA, Ph.D.; and Harper A. Roehm, CPA, DBA
In his book If Aristotle Ran General Motors, Tom Morris makes a compelling case that creating an ethical climate in the workplace is about more than promulgating clear guidelines for ethical behavior and developing codes of conduct, the authors say. He argues that creating an ethical climate must focus on fostering what he calls socially harmonious relationships. The authors examine corporate policies and managerial practices that thwart such a culture and prevent an ethical, productive environment.

Making Ethics a Pervasive Component of Accounting Education
By Connie Esmond-Kiger
The author says that accounting educators should try to make students "exude ethics," and this is one of her goals in her classroom. Here she presents several ideas for self-reflective assignments that may be used in the classroom to enhance students' ethical awareness and sensitivity. She says that, based on the results of a survey administered to students in the "pre-Enron" era versus the current "post-Enron" era, they seem to be working.

Project Management: A Core Compentency in Managerial Accounting Education
By David E. Stout, Ph.D.; Robert N. West, Ph.D., CPA; and Matthew J. Liberatore, Ph.D.
The authors describe how a graduate-level managerial accounting course was developed that covered strategic cost management, project management, and performance assessment and is linked with a university's objectives and strategic plans. They also discuss the resource commitments needed to deliver the new course.

Naked Truths About Accounting Curricula
By Lakshmi U. Tatikonda, Ph.D., CMA, CPA, CIA, CPIM, CQM
Accounting education is at a crossroads, the author says, and needs to change to help prepare students for the real world of management accounting and financial accounting. She takes a look at the state of current and historical perspectives of accounting education, the public accounting influence on accounting education, how to develop a flexible accounting curriculum without adding more credits, and how industry and IMA can influence accounting curricula and make a difference.