Do Accountancy Skills of Management Influence the Attainment of Key Financial Objectives in Selected South African Fast Moving Consumer Goods Small, Medium and Micro Enterprises?

Abstract

In a South African dispensation SMMEs play an important socio-economic role as they add much needed value to the national economy. Unfortunately as much as 75 per cent of these business entities fail after being in operation for less than four years – a failure rate that is regarded to be among the worst in the world. In order for SMMEs to remain in operation key financial objectives need to be achieved and it is believed that the lack of skills (among other factors) may adversely affect the latter. Thus, for this study, the primary objective was to ascertain whether accountancy skills of members of management, of selected South African fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) Small, Medium and Micro Enterprises (SMMEs) had any influence over the attainment of their respective business entities’ key financial objectives. Descriptive research was performed through the deployment of quantitative research methods whereby a survey was disseminated to 500 members of management of FMCG SMMEs. Stemming from the results, it became apparent that accountancy skills did have a positive statistically significant influence over sampled South African SMMEs’ attainment of key financial objectives, but only to a marginal extent.

Keywords

• accountancy skills; smmes; south africa; financial objectives