The Relationship between Target Costing and Competitive Advantage of Jordanian Private Universities

The study explored the relationship between target costing and competitiveness at Jordanian Private Universities. The research question regarding target costing focused on leadership of target selling price, customer needs, degree of developing a team work, cost of the product life cycle, stage of product design and value chain development. A questionnaire was used to elicit data. Two scales were used to measure the estimates by financial managers, directors of planning and quality, and heads of accounting departments in the universities. The sample size was 50 subjects, and response rate was 80%. Findings of the study indicated that: universities have a medium target costing dimensions of (3.48); the dimension of target selling price leadership was the highest and reducing the life cycle of university specialization was the lowest; universities enjoy a medium competitive advantages with a score of (3.46); and expansion in specializations was the highest in performance and university’s specializations cost was the weakest. Results showed a significant difference in the strength of links between the dimensions of the target costing technique and the dimensions of strengthening the competitive advantage. Recommendations suggested that universities in general and Jordanian Private Universities in particular, have to activate the dimensions of target costing technique to achieve the competitive advantages and promote it.