ACCG 250 ACCOUNTING SYSTEMS DESIGN AND DEVELOPMENT Department of Accounting and Corporate Governance

Research Project
Major Research Project on SAP (30%) Important note: This is an individual assignment. You must complete the task independently. If you submit a report that is similar to any of
your classmates reports it will be considered academic dishonesty. Refer to the Macquarie University Academic Honesty Procedure and associated documents. Please also refer to the submission instruction as per unit guide.

Estimated student workload: 30 hours Learning outcomes

Understand the role of information systems in general, and accounting information systems specifically, in supporting the operations of an organisation. 2. Understand the importance and benefits of systems development methodologies.
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Task
Your task is to write a report that critically analyses the adoption of SAP systems in business organisations and discuss accounting challenges and benefits in an SAP environment. You are required to conduct a literature review and analysis using academic journal articles through the library databases on the topic of SAP adoption and diffusion in business organisations. Your report must be structured as follows: 1) Introduction (100 words) Provide an overview of the report that follows. 2) Overview of SAP (300 words) - Provide an explanation of SAP and its functionalities. Provide examples of other commercial ERP systems available on the market. 3) Challenges and benefits (700 words) - Discuss accounting challenges and benefits that have been identified in the research literature (academic journal articles you reviewed) concerning SAP adoption.

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4) Recommendation (300 words) - From your literature review, provide recommendations of success factors for SAP adoption. 5) Conclusion (100 words) Summarise and synthesise the report.

Required
Write a report that addresses all of the above sections. Format requirements: Times New Roman size 12 with 1.5 line spacing, approximately 1500 words in total (not including references). You must include the total of words used in your report. The report should have appropriate headings and subheadings (including an introduction and conclusion). This report must use academic journal articles to support any claims you make. You must acknowledge the use of the work of others (e.g. the academic journal articles on which your report is based) using the Harvard referencing style (see http://www.lib.mq.edu.au/research/referencing.html). Any ideas or quotations must be correctly cited in the body of your report and a reference list must be provided at the end of your report. Once you have submitted your report, check the originality report in turn-it-in and ensure similarity with other sources is referenced. You can resubmit your report until the due date. Please note that the originality report for a resubmission takes 24 hours to be produced. Please ensure that you allow adequate time, if you are considering resubmission. Review the marking rubric so that you understand the expected standards and how you will receive feedback.

Submission
You need to upload your assignment to http://ilearn.mq.edu.au (Turn-it-in) by 5:00pm of 28 April 2014 otherwise your assignment will be considered late.

Penalties Late submission will be penalised at the rate of 20 percent of the available marks per day.

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Marking Rubric
1) Quality of research and referencing (40%) Not attempted (0%) No attempt. or The answer is copied or substantially copied from materials or other sources. No attempt. or The answer is copied or substantially copied from materials or other sources. Fail (40%) Poor quality of research. No evidence of academic peer reviewed journal articles. Inaccurate or no referencing. Report indicates poor or no understanding of the functionality/role of SAP, and issues involved in the adoption of SAP, poorly supported by references Pass (60%) Evidence of some academic peer reviewed journal articles with limited number academic journal articles cited, although poor quality and/or not related to the topic. Report indicates a limited understanding of the functionality/role of SAP, and issues involved in the adoption of SAP, generally supported by references. Report mostly follows the structure given and information is generally clearly organised within each section. Credit (70%) Evidence of academic peer reviewed journal articles with some good quality citations and references, mostly related to the topic. Distinction (80%) Evidence of academic peer reviewed journal articles with good quality citations and references all related to the topic. Report indicates a high level of understanding of the functionality/role of SAP, and issues involved in the adoption of SAP particularly from accounting perspective, generally supported by references. Report follows the structure given and information in each section is organised in a clear and logical way. High Distinction (100%) Extensive range of high quality academic journal articles all related to the topic cited.

2) Critical analysis and understanding of SAP (40%)

Report indicates a good understanding of the functionality/role of SAP, and issues involved in the adoption of SAP, generally supported by references.

Report indicates a broad and deep understanding of the functionality/role of SAP and issues involved in the adoption of SAP particularly from accounting perspective, consistently supported by references. Report follows the structure given and information in each section is presented in a clear logical way that supports the overall point/argument of that section. Presentation is of a professional standard, with little or no formatting, spelling, grammar, referencing errors/inconsistencies.

3) Structure (10%)

No attempt, or The answer is copied or substantially copied from materials or other sources No attempt, or The answer is copied or substantially copied from materials or other sources

Report does not follow the structure given and information is not generally clearly organised within each section. Presentation is of a very poor standard, with numerous errors/ inconsistencies.

Report follows the structure given and information is generally clearly organised within each section.

4) Presentation including formatting, spelling, grammar, referencing (10%)

Presentation is of a basic standard, with some formatting, spelling, grammar, referencing errors/inconsistencies

Presentation is of a good standard, with infrequent formatting, spelling, grammar, referencing errors/inconsistencies.

Presentation is of a good standard, with little or no formatting, spelling, grammar, referencing errors/inconsistencies.

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