SUMMARY
Prevailing threads of management theory over the past century provide an intriguing backdrop for major innovations in external financial reporting. Three prevailing management theories, the efficiency movement, the human resource movement, and the strategy movement, are first identified and discussed. Evidence demonstrates that financial reporting innovations coincided with the rise of these theories. Thus, the needs of management, and not merely investors, play a critical role in external financial reporting. The article concludes with an examination of the strategy movement’s continuing role in financial reporting through integrated reporting.