Difficulty Level of the Budget Target
An easy budget target may fail to encourage employees to give their best efforts. A budget target that is very difficult to achieve can, however, discourage managers from even trying to attain it. Exhibit 10.23 depicts research findings on the relationship between the level of employee effort and level of difficulty of budget targets. Ideally, budget targets should be
challenging yet attainable. But what is a challenging and attainable budget target?
Research by Merchant and Manzoni suggests that a “highly achievable target,” that is, one achievable by most managers 80 to 90 percent of the time, serves quite well in the vast majority of organizations, especially when accompanied by extra rewards for performances exceeding the target. 14 According to Merchant (1990), the advantages of using such a target include:
1. Increasing managers’ commitment to achieving the budget target.
2. Maintaining managers’ confidence in the budget.
3. Decreasing the cost of organizational control.
4. Reducing the risk that managers will engage in harmful “earnings management” practices
or violate corporate ethical standards.
5. Allowing effective and efficient managers greater operating flexibility.
6. Improving predictability of earnings or operating results.
7. Enhancing the usefulness of a budget as a planning and coordinating tool.