Strategy planning in Accounting firms in São Paulo city

Abstract

The profit organizations acting in competitive segments, including accounting services firms, have been facing difficulties lately, mainly because of the dynamics of their acting markets.Therefore, it could be relevant to define their future desired situation, which demands the adoption of strategies and its consequent planning. In this way, the aim of this research was to investigate how 50 accounting firms in São Paulo city pose themselves regarding the importance of the strategy planning and the implementation of it. This research was applied and descriptive, done by means of quantitative approach, based on the Cluster Analysis, which was used to understand the nature of the existing relationships between the firms researched,so as to identify similar or different clusters. It was applied a questionnaire, that went through prior tests and validation, including questions to identify the sample, together with 34questions in Likert scale, aiming to identify the discriminatory power of the obtained findings.Most respondents considered that the strategy planning is relevant. However, the obtained perception was not linked with an effective intention of implementation. Those results indicate the behavior of accounting firms that has already been observed in literature, regarding organizations in general. Furthermore, there is a future demand to investigate the reasons for such a difference between the intention and the real practice related by respondents.