Activity-based costing as a performance tool for library and information technology services

摘要

The Australian government has long signaled its intention to build performance indicators into the resource allocation process for higher education. Through the early 1990s the federal government gave strong indications to the sector that higher education places might in future be allocated on the basis of cost performance. In 1991, the Federal Government commissioned Russell Linke to produce a report on performance indicators in higher education. The present federal government, under Prime Minister Howard, has introduced cuts to higher education funding and the continued pressure for efficiency gains has seen an increased desire on the part of government for scrutiny of costs on a comparative basis.The Relative Funding Model, introduced in 1991, has never been seen as based on "ideal" teaching costs, and since that time the realisation of the potential of information technology in the learning process has suggested it might be time to revisit these and other issues. In 1998 the federal government again sponsored an inquiry into the sector, this time in the application of activity based costing as the basis for comparative assessment, resulting in several pilot studies in 1999-2000. This paper reviews the application of activity based costing to library and information technology services at the University of Newcastle, which was additional to but concurrent with these 1999-2000 studies.