The research instrument was a questionnaire developed in accordance with previous
research and designed to accommodate the management accounting functions of
planning, controlling, and decision making. The questionnaire, reviewed by three
academics, and using Cronbach alpha 0.95 to assess reliability, was sent by post in
October 2010 to 1,500 enterprises in hopes of yielding the required sample size. Four
hundred twenty-two enterprises (of which, 380 SE and 42 ME) returned completed
questionnaires, thus meeting the sample size requirement. The questionnaires
solicited entrepreneur and company profiles and asked, on a 5-point Likert scale,
the perceived levels of importance of management accounting and the perceived
levels of need for management accounting in planning, controlling, and decisionmaking
in the SME. Level of perceptions and needs were analyzed by mean and
standard deviation.