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An intensive exchange between academia and corporate business is useful – for both parties. To support this interaction, the “Campus for Controlling” at WHU – Otto Beisheim School of Manage-ment was founded in 2007. The main goal of the conference, which took place the 5th time at WHU –, is the presentation of the status quo and developments of controlling as well as giving German-speaking controlling experts the opportunity to get together and to network.

In his speech Jürgen Weber welcomed more than 100 controllers and financial managers to the 5th Campus for Controlling on 30th September.

What are the determinants of future controlling practices and what are the accompanying challenges for controllers? The event focused on these questions. In his opening presentation, Jürgen Weber gave exclusive insights into the new WHU-study about the upcoming topics of controlling. IT systems and efficiency & controlling are heading the list of future controlling topics, two classical aspects of the controlling domain. In addition to these traditional topics, the respondents of the WHU-study rated volatility, sustainability and the controller’s role as business partner as important future themes. Furthermore these upcoming topics were guide themes during the entire campus.

For example, Wolfgang Hagen, Senior Vice President Corporate Controlling BASF SE, emphasized the changing job requirements of controllers in the future. He focused on the question how the role of controllers can be realized successfully into becoming real business partners in an international context.

Utz Schäffer’s presentation focused on a completely new topic for controllers: sustainability. He responded to the question what controlling can do due to the topic sustainability and which factors were responsible for a greater relevance of this topic. Corporate “real life” examples illustrated the future development and importance of that topic, and made clear which potential could be realized if the German economy in general as well as controllers in specific would get involved in that devel-opment at the right time.

Karl-Heinz Steinke’s presentation, Head of Coporate Controlling and Cost Management Lufthansa AG, was about the planning risks in volatile contexts. The airline industry is faced with high volatility like no other industry. Therefore, Karl-Heinz Steinke explained how Lufthansa AG is managing successfully these planning risks.

Carsten Knobel, Corporate Senior Vice President Finance - Corporate Controlling and Financial Director Cosmetics & Toiletries bei Henkel AG & Co. KGaA, named volatility, postponements of growth and innovation projects, consolidation of the supplier and customer base as main drivers for changes in the controlling domain. Specifically, he explained how controlling acting as a business partner can support the organizational speed and responsiveness.

In his closing speech, Utz Schäffer mentioned that the WHU-controller panel will continue to investigate future topics concerning controlling. Accordingly, first agenda topics are set for the next years WHU Campus for Controlling, which takes place at the 13th and 14th of September 2012.

The economy is currently faced with a major crisis and it is as yet uncertain for how long and how far reaching it will be. This uncertainty also applies to the impact of the crisis on management accounting and control. For this reason, we have decided to follow the course of the crisis using empirical methods. We use a short questionnaire to collect evaluations of the crisis and its consequences for controlling.

Three surveys on the effects of the crisis have been carried out among panel companies to date. This data allows us to make observations on the progression of the crisis which will be crucial for determining the focus of future management accounting activities. You can download the findings (in German) under Studies.

Parallel to the Crisis Study in Germany, a similar study has been carried out in France in cooperation with the DFCG and the Université Paris-Dauphine.

The first benchmarking findings from China will be available soon. You can find more information about this on our China Panel homepage.