Management accounting appeared with the industrial revolution, through one of the earliest management tools: cost accounting. Used to determine the unit cost of products and applied only to manufacturing, it gradually evolved into cost analysis and into the field we know today, applicable to all sectors of the economy.
Technological development has profoundly changed the role of management accountants. Sophisticated information systems make it possible to use complex decision-making models and have freed accountants from concentrating on data collection and calculations. The result has been to make even more evident the need for accounting professionals able to interpret the data, design systems, make projections and participate in the decision-making process.
Since the mid 1980s, the profession has been growing exponentially. In the context of market globalization, management accounting has become the field of expertise of CMAs. This phenomenon accelerated in 1990 with the advent of an innovative education and accreditation process, which was entirely reworked in the late 90's to give way to the CMA Strategic Leadership Program.
Thanks to the harmonious integration of their accounting and management expertise, CMAs are now managers who intervene strategically in a wide variety of organizations.
Passage of Bill 46 in December 2007 has terminated the monopoly exercised by chartered accountants over public accounting since 1946. Although from now on, all CMAs with the qualifications to practice public accountancy are able to do so, on condition of obtaining an auditor’s permit from the CMA Order, management accounting remains the domain of CMAs.