Maxwell Appliance Controls

Robert S. Kaplan

Case | HBS Case Collection | October 1991 (Revised September 1998)

Maxwell Appliance Controls

Abstract

A profitable manufacturing division of a large company is looking for new ways to identify sources of productivity improvements. Led by its senior finance officer, an activity-based cost system is developed to identify activities performed for its highly varied product line and diverse customers. The activity-based cost system is supposed to support the division's quality, employee teamwork, and continuous improvement activities that attempt to identify wasteful or non-value-added work practices. Senior operating executives, however, are not sure how the information should be applied for these efforts. The case provides an extensive description of activities and activity drivers developed by the cost system's designers, and also contains an extensive description of the development and design process. Can be used as a comprehensive review on the design of activity-based cost systems, and to generate a discussion on the difficulties of getting a traditional organization to internalize the messages from the ABC information.

Keywords: Activity Based Costing and Management; Management Teams; Quality; Performance Improvement; Organizational Culture; Problems and Challenges; Production; Manufacturing Industry;

Format: Print

26 pages

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Citation:

Kaplan, Robert S. "Maxwell Appliance Controls." Harvard Business School Case 192-058, October 1991. (Revised September 1998.)

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Maxwell Appliance Controls

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