Research productivity of Australian accounting academics

In recent decades, substantial changes have impacted the global academy, such as the increasing use of key performance metrics for academics. This study provides recent evidence of Australian accounting academics’ performance in publishing in A/A* journals during the period 2010–2018. We find that the top 25 percent of Australian academics produce approximately 60 percent of published journal articles through an analysis of the A/A* Australian Business Deans′ Council (ABDC) accounting journal listing. The majority of published Australian co‐authored research output in the sample is in A ranked journals (80 percent), with only 20 percent observed in A* ranked journals.     

Verifying alternative measures of the service-quality construct: consistencies and contradictions

Abstract

Since the role of service quality for organisational survival and success is of outmost importance, its measurement is still receiving increased attention. SERVQUAL and its alternative measures, namely, SERVPERF, weighted SERVQUAL, and weighted SERVPERF, are the most widespread in the service-quality literature. Yet, research has not concluded regarding the relative superiority of any of these measures. The present study compares all four alternatives within the auto-repair industry in Greece. Based on data from 1043 customers, overall results are in line with previous studies, confirming the multidimensionality of the service-quality construct and the five-factor SERVPERF pattern. In disagreement with previous studies, findings show that the importance-weighted SERVPERF scale provides the greatest diagnostic information. Furthermore, significant variation was found in the predictive validity of the measures.     

Relationships in Franchised Distribution System: the Case of the Spanish Market

The purpose of this article is to examine long-term inter-firm relationship management and to investigate empirically if trust and commitment are essential variables for relationship success. This study analyses both the relationship between two behaviours (cooperation and exchange information) and the development of trust and commitment as well as their effects on long-term orientation, satisfaction and performance. The unit of analysis is the dyadic relationship, assessing separately franchisor's and franchisees' perspectives, and comparing similarities and differences across perspectives (Anderson & Narus, ; Jap, ). The model proposed has been tested with 107 franchisors and 102 franchisees operating both in the retail (food and beverages, fashions, furniture …) and the service sector (estate agencies, education, dry-cleaner's, diverse services …) in the Spanish franchised distribution system. Results show that both commitment and trust are key variables for long-term relationship success from the franchisors perspective, but that from the franchisees side, trust is the key variable for relationship success.     

The Psychology of Billing

Contracting between tax entities and tax professionals occurs millions of times every year, yet little is known about the nature of these economic interactions. This study examines the effect of commonly occurring contextual factors on tax professionals’ billing decisions for tax research. These contextual factors are unrelated to the tax research itself and the time it takes to conduct the tax research, but we find that billing decisions are strongly influenced by the three non‐time‐related contextual factors that we manipulate. Initial client volume impacts amounts billed for tax research, with lower initial client volume resulting in higher per client fees. Further, we find that initial billing decisions serve as value billing benchmarks for unanticipated subsequent clients who benefit from research conducted for initial clients. As a result, subsequent clients are billed higher fees when they follow a smaller number of initial clients. We also find that client referrals are billed higher fees than nonclient referrals because professionals attempt to avoid making initial clients feel as though they have been treated unfairly relative to subsequent clients who would otherwise be billed lower fees. The results of this study are relevant beyond the traditional confines of accounting research—they are relevant to the millions of tax entities that contract with tax professionals each year.     

The executive compensation implications of the tax component of earnings

We extend prior research by examining the weight applied to earnings generated by changes in ETRs (i.e., the tax component of earnings) in determining CEO and CFO compensation. We examine both bonus and total compensation and find that the predicted relationships between compensation and the tax component of earnings are largely limited to bonus compensation. This is not surprising since bonus compensation represents an unambiguous link between contemporaneous performance and compensation, while equity compensation is in part determined by agency considerations. Our evidence suggests that both CEOs and CFOs are compensated for the tax component of earnings. We find that CEOs are rewarded equally for the tax component of earnings relative to other components of earnings, while CFOs are rewarded more for the tax component of earnings relative to other components of earnings. Additionally, the weight applied to the tax component of earnings when determining CFO bonus compensation is greater when; (1) the tax component of earnings does not appear to be related to earnings management; (2) ETRs decrease rather than increase, (3) the firm pays bonus based on after-tax earnings rather than pre-tax earnings, and (4) the firm is tax aggressive rather than non-tax aggressive. The variations in the weighting of the tax component of earnings for CFO bonus compensation noted above in combination with evidence that CEO bonus compensation is indifferent to ETR-related earnings versus other components of earnings, suggests that the tax component of earnings is a contractual component of CFO bonus compensation.