Are audit partners’ compensation and audit quality related to their consulting revenues?

Recent accounting scandals have triggered renewed interest in the debate concerning whether audit firms should be banned from providing consulting services. Compared to the voluminous studies on consulting services to audit clients (i.e., non-audit services, hereafter NAS), little has been done to investigate consulting services to non-audit clients (hereafter CS). This study examines whether audit partners' revenues from CS are associated with: i) partners' compensation, and ii) audit quality (AQ), while controlling for revenues from NAS and auditing. We choose the Norwegian setting because of the unique and proprietary data on CS at the audit partner level. Our results provide initial evidence that partners' compensation is positively associated with their revenues generated from CS. Regarding AQ, our findings indicate no relation between AQ and partners' revenues from CS. This study contributes to the recent debate on multidisciplinary audit firms and should be of interest to regulators, audit firms, and users of audited financial statements.     

Show me the money-cut: Shareholder dividend suspensions and voluntary CEO pay cuts during the COVID pandemic

Many US companies with December 31, 2019 as their fiscal year end had their Annual Shareholder Meeting scheduled (usually online) during the COVID pandemic. Unexpectedly faced with significant changes in operating environments, some companies decided to suspend shareholder dividend payments. In normal circumstances, this would be interpreted as a very negative event and shareholders could be expected to respond adversely at the annual meeting. However, we investigate whether CEOs were able to maintain shareholder support by offering a previously unheard of response of “sharing the pain”, committing to cut their own pay following a dividend suspension. At issue is whether investors acted as if they updated their inferences using the new voluntary pay-cut decision to infer the extent to which the CEOs underlying personality type was well matched to crisis management. We estimate an instrumental variables model in which the dividend suspension is used as an instrument for the endogenous pay cut variable.     

Are more able managers good future tellers? Learning from Japan

Baik et al. (2011) find that high-ability managers in the U.S. are more likely to issue accurate management earnings forecasts. Focusing on Japan, where management earnings forecasts are effectively mandated, we extend the literature by exploring (1) whether the relationship between managerial ability and forecast accuracy is unique to the U.S. disclosure system, where management forecasts are voluntary, and (2) how high-ability managers increase their forecast accuracy. We find that managerial ability is negatively associated with forecast errors based on initial forecasts, suggesting that high-ability managers are more likely to issue accurate forecasts at the beginning of the fiscal year. We then show that high-ability managers are less likely to revise their initial earnings forecasts and less likely to use earnings management to improve the accuracy of their earnings forecasts. Our findings show that, while high-ability managers are more likely to issue accurate initial management forecasts, low-ability managers are more likely to revise their forecasts and conduct earnings management to reduce their forecast errors.     

Sales to centre stage! Determinants of the division in strategic sales decisions within the MNE

Extant international business (IB) literature on Headquarter (HQ)-subsidiary relationships has established that where decision-making occurs, it influences a firm’s performance. Existing studies propose that the degree of autonomy in decision-making at subsidiary level is not the same for all value chain activities, paying more attention to upstream activities. This paper contributes by exploring decision-making autonomy in downstream strategic sales activities. Sales has rarely been centre stage in IB investigations and we therefore lack thorough understanding of its role and importance within the MNE decision-making processes. Conducting a mixed methods exploratory study in the fast-moving consumer goods sector in Germany, we test for antecedents and outcomes of subsidiaries’ strategic sales decision-making autonomy. Results confirm external and internal embeddedness as antecedents, and the dominant role played by the local context, but provide insights into potential risks of internal embeddedness. Results challenge existing theory inasmuch as subsidiary importance is not a significant driver. A critical implication of this finding is that, compared to upstream activities, the HQ may not have the option of mandating a subsidiary to transfer sales strategy skills and knowledge across the network. Our results show that, in an era of globalisation of sales, and internationalisation of retailers, HQ managers must pay heed to directly interacting with subsidiaries and to sharing strategic sales decision-making across the network to consolidate the MNE’s global sales strategy.     

The relationship between the playfulness climate in the classroom and student creativity

The main purpose of this study was to determine whether the spontaneous playfulness that occurs in the classroom and contributes the class climate influences the creativity of students. The study found that the management and creation of fun-loving and happy class atmosphere was important to vocational high school students. Data collected to test the study hypothesis showed a positive correlation between the class climate related to playfulness and students’ graphic and linguistic creativity. The “cooperation and intimacy” feature of the class climate was able to directly predict student creativity.     

X五金公司采购业务流程研究

采购是企业与资源市场的信息接口,原材料的价格、质量和速度直接影响到企业最终产品的成本、品质和周期。对于制造型企业,在小批量、多品种、周期短、变化大的环境下存在着采购、计划、生产与销售不协调的诸多问题。文章分析了制造型企业采购流程的各个环节,探讨了在各个环节中需要注意的问题,规范了采购作业,得出在制造型企业中可行的采购流程方案。从而缩短了制造型企业的产品开发周期,提高了企业的竞争力。     

浅析高职赴日留学现状——以苏州工业园区服务外包职业学院为例

本文在苏州工业园区服务外包职业学院2014年赴日留学生情况调研结果的基础上,结合国内的留学趋势以及专业人才需求,总结日语教育模式以及对日文化交流的经验,在与日本院校的交流与日语社团活动、日语教学和赴日培训方面为高职院校培养日语人才提供一定的参考。     

遗产旅游地意象媒介传播机制——苏州园林与江南古镇的比较研究

旅游地意象既包括旅游者经实地体验形成的复合意象,也包括那些远离旅游地的潜在旅游者借助各类媒介信息所形成的引致意象.在新媒体时代,传媒在旅游地意象传播中所扮演的角色越来越重要,分析和研究旅游地意象媒介传播机制现已成为该领域前沿课题.为探索遗产旅游地意象媒介传播模式,文章结合苏州园林和江南古镇案例,采用焦点组访谈、内容分析、问卷调查等方法获取9365例样本的旅游目的地意象媒介传播数据,在质性分析基础上,通过在遗产旅游地意象属性因素与传播媒介因素之间建立结构方程模型,并根据系列研究假设验证结果,揭示出传统媒体与新媒体在遗产旅游地意象形成中的实际作用机制.结论认为,传统媒体与新媒体在文化遗产旅游地意象传播中存在功能互补,前者的优势在于遗产形态与形象推广,而后者的优势则在于遗产文化与意义诠释;借助传统媒体扣新媒体传播不同类型的遗产旅游地意象信息,能够在激发遗产旅游需求的同时,帮助公众更完整地理解遗产文化价值和精神内涵,从而在潜在旅游者中塑造更优良的遗产旅游地意象.在文化遗产旅游地意象传播中,传统媒体与新媒体的整合使用,代表着文化遗产旅游地意象传播的必然.     

“时空压缩”与客源市场空间结构演变——以江苏国际旅游客源市场为例

"时空压缩"是信息化和全球化的必然产物,为旅游客源市场空间结构提供了全新的研究视角.在推定"时空压缩"作用下旅游地客源市场空间结构演变规律的基础上,运用假设检验法对江苏国际旅游客源市场进行了实证研究,结果表明传统的距离摩擦定律对旅游地客源市场空间分布特点和演化规律的支配作用日渐式微,旅游地客源市场空间发展兼有波浪式推进和跳跃式增长两种方式,并据此确定江苏国际旅游的重点市场、主要市场、潜力市场和机会市场,同时对"时空压缩"背景下江苏国际旅游客源市场的开拓提出相应的建议与对策.