This paper aims to introduce the emerging artificial-intelligence-based readability metrics (Coh-Metrix) to examine the effects of firm size on audit proposal readability.
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to introduce the emerging artificial-intelligence-based readability metrics (Coh-Metrix) to examine the effects of firm size on audit proposal readability.
Design/methodology/approach
Coh-Metrix readability measures use emerging computation linguistics technology to better assess document readability. These metrics measure co-relations of words, sentences and paragraphs on multi-dimensions rather than adopting the unidimensional “bag of words” approach that examines words in isolation. Using eight Coh-Metrix orthogonal principal component factors, the authors analyze the Chang and Stone (2019) data set comprised of 370 hand-collected audit proposals submitted by audit firms for the US state and local governments’ audit service contracts.
Findings
Audit firm size has a significant impact on the readability of audit proposals. Specifically, as measured by the traditional readability metric, the proposals from smaller firms are more readable than those submitted by larger firms. Furthermore, decomposed readability metrics indicate that smaller firm proposals evidence stronger (deep) text cohesion, whereas larger firm proposals evidence a stronger narrative structure and higher connectivity (relational indicators) among proposal elements. Unlike the traditional readability metric, however, the emergent readability metrics are uncorrelated with auditor selection.
Research limitations/implications
Work remains to develop and validate Coh-Metrix measures that are specific to the context of accounting and auditing practice. Future research can use emerging readability measures to examine various textual features (e.g. text cohesion) in finance or accounting related documents.
Practical implications
The results provide practitioners with insight into the proposal writing strategies and practices of larger and smaller firms. In addition, the results highlight the differing audit firm selection outcomes from traditional and Coh-Metrix readability metrics.
Originality/value
This study introduces new data and holistic readability measures to the auditing literature.
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Hank C. Alewine and Dan N. Stone
The increasing use of complex, nonfinancial environmental performance measures in managerial decisions motivates consideration of contextual influences that potentially impact…
Abstract
The increasing use of complex, nonfinancial environmental performance measures in managerial decisions motivates consideration of contextual influences that potentially impact managerial judgments in environmental settings. This study extends general evaluability theory (GET: Hsee & Zhang, 2010) to environmental accounting by investigating the combined effects of evaluation mode and incomplete supplemental evaluability information (SEI; e.g., benchmark data) on management decisions. To elaborate, evaluation mode is the display format in which the accounting information system (AIS) provides available information for analysis; e.g., a manager’s or business unit’s performance is assessed either comparatively (i.e., in joint mode) or individually (i.e., in separate mode). GET suggests more decision weight on measures containing SEI in separate mode because that evaluation mode contains less context in which to analyze information. On the other hand, more decision weight should result for measures that do not contain SEI in joint mode because that mode already contains more context for analysis (e.g., comparing multiple performances with each other). To test these predictions, experimental participants (n = 53) evaluated environmental measures for factories with similar environmental performances. To operationalize the information available in many environmental AIS, some, but not all, performance measures contained benchmark data (incomplete SEI); factories were evaluated either jointly or separately. Participants evidenced decision intransitivity; i.e., in separate evaluation mode, factories rated higher when a favorable measure contained SEI, while in joint evaluation mode, factories rated higher when a favorable measure lacked SEI. The results extend previous AIS and management accounting research by investigating contextual influences, and potential systems design elements, in judgments using environmental AIS.
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This paper aims to examine the effects of firm size on audit proposal readability and audit proposal readability on auditor selection using readability metrics.
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to examine the effects of firm size on audit proposal readability and audit proposal readability on auditor selection using readability metrics.
Design/methodology/approach
Adopting the Flesch reading ease readability formula, the authors analyze the readability of 370 hand-collected audit proposals submitted by audit firms for US state and local governments’ audit service contracts.
Findings
The authors find differences in readability across audit firm size, specifically the proposals written by smaller firms are more readable than those submitted by larger firms. The results further indicate that readability metrics correlate with auditor selection, i.e. an increase in audit proposal readability from the first to third quartile improves the likelihood of a firm winning the engagement by about 6 per cent, ceteris paribus. In addition, while audit fees and an existing auditor–client relationship are associated with engagement success, proxies for audit quality (i.e. audit firm size, audit experience of lead partner) are not.
Research limitations/implications
The Flesch reading ease measure is a simple linear combination of text attributes, which assumes that readability is a single, unidimensional construct. Simple readability metrics, such as the Flesch reading ease, may confound environmental complexity with readability.
Practical implications
Readability improves audit proposal success.
Originality/value
The results provide insight to accounting stakeholders regarding the potential influence of readability on audit firm selection. In short, readability matters.
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R. Cameron Cockrell and Dan N. Stone
The paper seeks to extend self‐determination theory (SDT) and the triple helix model of knowledge sharing to predict that between‐industry differences in financial rewards and the…
Abstract
Purpose
The paper seeks to extend self‐determination theory (SDT) and the triple helix model of knowledge sharing to predict that between‐industry differences in financial rewards and the quality of knowledge‐sharing motivation will explain the extent of useless, pseudo‐knowledge sharing.
Design/methodology/approach
Participants are certified management accountant (CMA) survey respondents in two industries: finance, insurance, and real estate (FIRE; n=52) and higher education (n=50).
Findings
Consistent with predictions, the results indicate more pseudo‐knowledge sharing occurs among FIRE than among higher‐education CMAs, and, financial incentives and the quality of knowledge‐sharing motivation fully mediate the effect of industry on pseudo‐knowledge sharing.
Research limitations/implications
A larger sample, and triangulating the survey data with archival and non‐self‐reported measures, would strengthen the inferences and conclusions.
Practical implications
Industry culture, through its influence on financial rewards and organizational knowledge culture, may affect the success or failure of organizational knowledge‐sharing initiatives.
Originality/value
This is among the first investigations to define and investigate “dark”, pseudo‐knowledge sharing, which can impede organizational goals.
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Timothy C. Miller, Sean A. Peffer and Dan N. Stone
This study contributes to the participative budgeting and budget misrepresentation literature by exploring: (1) whether managers’ judgments of fair behaviors are malleable and…
Abstract
This study contributes to the participative budgeting and budget misrepresentation literature by exploring: (1) whether managers’ judgments of fair behaviors are malleable and context-dependent and (2) if these judgments of fair behavior impact cost reporting misrepresentations. Two experiments investigate these questions. Experiment 1 (n = 42) tests whether the behavior that managers judge to be “fair” differs based on the decision context (i.e., initial economic position [IEP]). Experiment 2 (n = 130) investigates: (1) how managers’ deployment of fairness beliefs influences their reporting misrepresentations and (2) how decision aids that reduce task complexity impact managers’ deployment of fairness beliefs in their misreporting decisions. The study found that managers deploy fairness beliefs (i.e., honesty or equality) consistent with maximizing their context-relevant income. Hence, fairness beliefs constrain misrepresentations in predictable ways. In addition, we find more accounting information is not always beneficial. The presence of decision aids actually increases misrepresentations when managers are initially advantaged (i.e., start with more resources than others). The implications from these findings are relevant to the honesty and budgeting literature and provide novel findings of how managers’ preferences for fairness constrain managers from maximizing their income. The chapter demonstrates that contextual factors can influence the deployment of managers’ fairness beliefs which, in turn, differentially impact their reporting misrepresentation. Another contribution is that providing decision aids, which reduce task complexity, may not always benefit companies, since such aids may increase misrepresentation under certain conditions.
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Candace L. Witherspoon, Jason Bergner, Cam Cockrell and Dan N. Stone
Knowledge is the most important component of sustainable organizational growth and economic performance. This meta‐analysis aims to summarize the determinants of individuals'…
Abstract
Purpose
Knowledge is the most important component of sustainable organizational growth and economic performance. This meta‐analysis aims to summarize the determinants of individuals' knowledge sharing (KS) intentions and behaviors in organizations.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors organize the knowledge sharing antecedents investigated in 46 studies (n≈10,487, median n=172) into three categories, i.e. knowledge sharer intention and attitude (four variables); rewards for KS (three variables); and organizational culture (nine variables).
Findings
Variables in all three antecedent categories positively contribute to KS intentions and behaviors; high between‐study variability exists, and the fail‐safe n statistic suggests the observed effects are robust against a “file drawer” (missing study) bias. Moderator results suggest that motivating KS is easier in collectivist, as opposed to individualist, cultures.
Research limitations/implications
In most of the studies included in this meta‐analysis, participants volunteered to share knowledge with researchers. Hence, an important threat to validity in the existing research is a potential “cooperation bias” in which participants likely overestimate their willingness to share knowledge. Future KS research should investigate the dark underbelly of knowledge activities in organizations, including investigations of knowledge hoarding, withholding of knowledge to gain personal advantage, and “contributing” worthless information to gain (through gaming) personal payoffs.
Originality/value
The meta‐analysis results herein contribute to the KS literature by identifying the determinants of KS, and an important potential limitation of much existing KS research.
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Hank C. Alewine and Dan N. Stone
Environmental consequences increasingly influence management strategy and choice. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effects on attention and investment of…
Abstract
Purpose
Environmental consequences increasingly influence management strategy and choice. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effects on attention and investment of: incorporating environmental data into a balanced scorecard (BSC), called the sustainability balanced score card (SBSC) and the organization of environmental accounting information.
Design/methodology/approach
In a between‐participant design, participants (n ≈ 95) chose from among two investments using BSCs. Participants were randomly assigned to one of three conditions: no environmental data (control or BSC condition); environmental data embedded within the traditional BSC (four‐perspective SBSC); or environmental data added to a BSC as a standalone fifth perspective (five‐perspective SBSC).
Findings
Investment to achieve environmental stewardship objectives was greater with the four‐perspective SBSC than the traditional BSC. In addition, participants were most efficient, i.e. spent the least total time, and least time per data element examined, with the four‐perspective SBSC. Finally, the time spent examining, and decision weight given to, environmental data were unrelated.
Research limitations/implications
Professional managers and accountants may have greater knowledge of environmental metrics than do students, who are the participants in this study; hence, the results may not generalize to higher knowledgeable professionals since their processing of environmental data may differ from the lower knowledge participants of this study.
Practical implications
The form (i.e. organization) of environmental accounting data changed the allocation of participants' attention while the presence of environmental accounting data changed participants' investments; hence, both the presence and form of environmental accounting information influenced decision making.
Originality/value
This study is among the first to show differing influences from both the presence and organization of environmental accounting data on attention and investment.
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Dan N. Stone, Alexei N. Nikitkov and Timothy C. Miller
This paper aims to adapt Simons’ (1995b) theory of the role of information technology (IT) in shaping and facilitating the levers of control (i.e. the Levers of Control Applied to…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to adapt Simons’ (1995b) theory of the role of information technology (IT) in shaping and facilitating the levers of control (i.e. the Levers of Control Applied to Information Technology – LOCaIT) as a framework for investigating how eBay’s business strategy was realized through its management control system (MCS) in the first 10 years of the online auction market.
Design and method
The qualitative method uses data from public record interviews, teaching cases, books, Securities and Exchange Commission filings and other archival sources to longitudinally trace the realization of eBay’s strategy through its MCS and IT.
Findings
Realizing its strategy through the eBay MCS necessitated a diagnostic control system unlike any previously seen. This system created a close-knit online community and enabled buyers and sellers to monitor one another’s performance and trustworthiness.
Research limitations and implications
The LOCaIT theory facilitated understanding the core aspects of the realization of eBay’s strategy through its MCS and IT. However, LOCaIT largely omits the strong linkages evident among elements of the MCS, the importance and necessity of building a core IT infrastructure to support eBay’s strategy and the central role of building consumer trust in the realization of this strategy.
Practical and social implications
eBay’s MCS is now, perhaps, the world’s most widely imitated model for creating online trust and user interactions (e.g. Yelp, TripAdvisor, Amazon). In addition, eBay’s MCS was “sold” as a consumer product that was instrumental in facilitating consumer trust in the online auction market.
Originality/value
Contributions include: tracing the creation, growth and evolution of, perhaps, the world’s largest and most widely imitated MCS, which redefined the boundaries of accounting systems monitoring; and testing the range, usefulness and limitations of Simons’ LOCaIT theory as a lens for understanding eBay’s use of IT in their MCS.
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This paper aims to explore accounting across time and space via novels.
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to explore accounting across time and space via novels.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper uses distant readings.
Findings
The paper reveals peculiarities and commonalities of the work of Certified Public Accountants 70 years ago and now.
Originality/value
The originality/value is to be decided by readers.