Value stream costing and decision-making: Implementations in lean production businesses

The inadequacy of traditional production and costing methods has become more evident due to consumer needs and demands being very variable and competition in the global market has increased. Some of the businesses that want to develop their production systems and accordingly their costing methods; started from the lean thinking approach to applying lean production, lean accounting, and lean costing. These businesses have been organized according to value streams and have adopted the value stream costing (VSC) method. By the increasing awareness of companies operating in Turkey on lean production, lean accounting, and value stream costing in recent years, it has come to the fore to change the production systems used by these companies and accordingly the performance measurement and costing methods. However, it is not possible to reflect the operational developments achieved in the lean production system to the financial statements as a short-term improvement. Accordingly, companies who decided to be lean by their production systems need to complete their lean maturity journey. It is possible for businesses that complete these processes with patience and success to replace their accounting systems with lean accounting and costing methods with value stream costing. The number of businesses that apply value stream costing in Turkey is limited. According to studies regarding lean accounting have been done in Turkey, value stream costing and lean decision-making are not sufficient. Therefore, this research focuses on the inadequacy of traditional costing methods in a lean production environment and value stream costing as a lean costing method that can be applied in such an environment. Within the scope of the research, a survey was conducted to lean manufacturing companies in Turkey. As a result of the research, lean manufacturing companies in Turkey; it can be said that the perception of ease of use for the individual on value stream costing behavioral intention to use; the perception of ease of use for the individual on the perception of usefulness for the individual, and the perception of ease of use in terms of organization has a statistically significant positive effect on the perception of usefulness in terms of organization. In addition, a case study analysis was conducted for the use of the value stream costing method in the cost calculation and decision-making process in a company that participated in the research survey and operates in the textile sector. As a result of the research, it has been revealed that weekly value stream costs and average unit cost of ABC Manufacturing Company are different from the amounts calculated according to the traditional system. In the traditional income statement and value stream income statement prepared for the purpose of determining the operating result, it is revealed that the sales revenue amounts are the same and the operating profit amounts are different. Also, regarding the use of value stream costing in the decision-making process, the existing capacity of Company ABC and the additional order decision process; evaluated with both the traditional variable costing and the value stream costing and resulted in the acceptance of the order. In the event that the current capacity of the enterprise is not sufficient, the decision process for the same additional order was evaluated according to both methods, and the order was rejected.