This study examines the current situation of responsibility accounting and proposed management solutions according to responsibility centers on public universities in Vietnam. The study applies quantitative research methods, and collected data through structured questionnaires to 138 public universities in Vietnam in 2019, receiving back 55 valid questionnaires. The data was cleaned and analyzed with SPSS software. The results show that most public universities in Vietnam assigned management responsibility to their departments, but responsibility accounting was not comprehensive since many universities are not financially autonomous. The Kruskal Wallis Test was conducted to compare the current situation of responsibility accounting among universities by the degree of autonomy and by geographic area. The research found out that totally autonomous universities assigned management responsibility to responsibility centers better than semiautonomous and non-autonomous universities did. Regarding the evaluation of management responsibility, universities in Central Vietnam rated specific quantitative criteria, residual income (RI) and returns on investment (ROI) higher than universities in the North and the South of Vietnam did. However, universities in the South of Vietnam rated the evaluation of profits by department higher than the rest. The study also suggests structure for establishing responsibility centers in accordance with public universities in Vietnam.

This paper aims to examine the application of cost-volume-profit (CVP) analysis by public universities in Vietnam. In the context where Vietnam is gradually transferring financial autonomy to public universities, the conduct of a CVP analysis in relation to these public universities is particularly urgent. Research samples were collected in 2018 and 2019 by surveying Vietnamese public universities. After collection, the data is synthesized by excel file, conformity check, data cleansing and data analysis on SPSS software by tools such as Frequency statistics, price statistics, and means. The results show that: (1) universities used the CVP analysis in decision-making, (2) information related to the CVP analysis used for decision-making by administrators remained simplistic and lacked cost-control details, and (3) the application of the CVP analysis by university administrators for decision-making was neither comprehensive nor coordinated. The findings also show that, given the current conditions in Vietnam, increasing the governance in public universities is essential, as is contributing to reducing costs, increasing universities’ income, providing the best service to students, and improving the quality of training. The study calls for the flexible application of the CVP analysis, which will provide information to help managers at Vietnamese public universities make the best decisions.

By applying behavioral intention theories and the theory of diffusion of innovation in organizations, this study identified several factors influencing the intention to apply management accounting in enterprises in Vietnam. Research data was collected from the questionnaire sent to Vietnamese enterprises in 2019, collecting 542 observations from accountants and directors. The data is, then, synthesized by excel file, conformity check, and processed by SPSS 20 software with descriptive statistics and multiple regression analysis. The results showed four factors that affect the intention to apply management accounting in enterprises in Vietnam: (1) Performance expectancy; (2) Effort expectancy; (3) Perceived trust; and (4) Subjective norms. The study pointed out that the above factors explain 60.618% of the variation of “intention to apply management accounting”, in which, Subjective norms has the strongest impact (regression coefficient is 0.238). The findings also show that raising the awareness of managers and accountants about the role of management accounting, improving the qualifications and knowledge of accountants, and increasing the trust of managers about management accounting information are needed to increase the level of management accounting application in Vietnamese enterprises. The study also proposes recommendations to improve the effectiveness of management accounting for managers in operation and decision-making.