Accounting

For researchers doing qualitative research, interviews are a commonly used method. Data collected through interviews can be recorded through field notes, transcripts, or tape recordings. In the literature, there is a debate regarding which of these recording methods should be used. There are issues of reliability, cost (time and money), loss of data, among others. Technology plays a pivotal role in this debate. Indeed, new technologies (e.g., direct coding) are often seen as potential replacements for older technologies (e.g., transcripts), which leads to a debate that is based on an evolution narrative (from field notes, to transcripts, to working from tape recordings). This article argues that a combination narrative should be considered where combination is better than substitution. Moreover, combining the advantages of field notes, transcripts, and working from tape recordings without accumulating each method’s disadvantages is possible because of new technology. To support this argument, two technological tools (OneNote and Smartpen) are presented as a way to increase the effectiveness, efficiency, and economy of qualitative data management.

For researchers doing qualitative research, interviews are a commonly used method. Data collected through interviews can be recorded through field notes, transcripts, or tape recordings. In the literature, there is a debate regarding which of these recording methods should be used. There are issues of reliability, cost (time and money), loss of data, among others. Technology plays a pivotal role in this debate. Indeed, new technologies (e.g., direct coding) are often seen as potential replacements for older technologies (e.g., transcripts), which leads to a debate that is based on an evolution narrative (from field notes, to transcripts, to working from tape recordings). This article argues that a combination narrative should be considered where combination is better than substitution. Moreover, combining the advantages of field notes, transcripts, and working from tape recordings without accumulating each method's disadvantages is possible because of new technology. To support ...

For researchers doing qualitative research, interviews are a commonly used method. Data collected through interviews can be recorded through field notes, transcripts, or tape recordings. In the literature, there is a debate regarding which of these recording methods should be used. There are issues of reliability, cost (time and money), loss of data, among others. Technology plays a pivotal role in this debate. Indeed, new technologies (e.g., direct coding) are often seen as potential replacements for older technologies (e.g., transcripts), which leads to a debate that is based on an evolution narrative (from field notes, to transcripts, to working from tape recordings). This article argues that a combination narrative should be considered where combination is better than substitution. Moreover, combining the advantages of field notes, transcripts, and working from tape recordings without accumulating each method’s disadvantages is possible because of new technology. To support this...

Cooperatives, which have a dual mission that includes both business and social goals, are of particular interest for the study of corporate social responsibility (CSR). The aim of this study was to examine how cooperative directors influence the CSR strategies of their organization. We used a multi-level conceptual framework, consisting of micro, meso, and macro levels, to analyze qualitative data (20 interviews, observation of two board meetings and analysis of over 25 public documents) collected through a case study design that focused on the directors of three financial cooperatives operating under a large group of Canadian financial service cooperatives. Our study contributes first by building on prior studies that link CSR goals to the cooperatives’ dual mission and commitment to improving their community. We enrich prior findings by showing how directors play a crucial role in the enactment of the social dimension of CSR, but that conversely, cooperatives are vehicles for dire...

The production of π +, π −, K+, K−, p, and $\overline{\mathrm{p}}$ at mid-rapidity has been measured in proton-proton collisions at $\sqrt{s} = 900~\mathrm{GeV}$ with the ALICE detector. Particle identification is performed using the specific energy loss in the inner tracking silicon detector and the time projection chamber. In addition, time-of-flight information is used to identify hadrons at higher momenta. Finally, the distinctive kink topology of the weak decay of charged kaons is used for an alternative measurement of the kaon transverse momentum (p t) spectra. Since these various particle identification tools give the best separation capabilities over different momentum ranges, the results are combined to extract spectra from p t=100 MeV/c to 2.5 GeV/c. The measured spectra are further compared with QCD-inspired models which yield a poor description. The total yields and the mean p t are compared with previous measurements, and the trends as a function of collision energy are discussed.

Waist-hip ratio (WHR) is a measure of body fat distribution and a predictor of metabolic consequences independent of overall adiposity. WHR is heritable, but few genetic variants influencing this trait have been identified. We conducted a meta-analysis of 32 genome-wide association studies for WHR adjusted for body mass index (comprising up to 77,167 participants), following up 16 loci in an additional 29 studies (comprising up to 113,636 subjects). We identified 13 new loci in or near RSPO3, VEGFA, TBX15-WARS2, NFE2L3, GRB14, DNM3-PIGC, ITPR2-SSPN, LY86, HOXC13, ADAMTS9, ZNRF3-KREMEN1, NISCH-STAB1 and CPEB4 (P = 1.9 × 10⁻⁹ to P = 1.8 × 10⁻⁴⁰) and the known signal at LYPLAL1. Seven of these loci exhibited marked sexual dimorphism, all with a stronger effect on WHR in women than men (P for sex difference = 1.9 × 10⁻³ to P = 1.2 × 10⁻¹³). These findings provide evidence for multiple loci that modulate body fat distribution independent of overall adiposity and reveal strong gene-by-sex...

Purpose: Women in public accounting firms are still proportionally much fewer in number in the highest levels of the hierarchy than men, whereas recruitment at junior level tends to be increasingly gender‐balanced. This paper aims to analyse the relationships between the glass ceiling and motherhood. The mechanisms explaining the difficulties encountered by auditor mothers in their hierarchical progression within the Big Four in France are identified.

Design/methodology/approach: From 24 interviews with male and female auditors of various hierarchical levels, one seeks to reveal the specificity of the difficulties encountered by auditor mothers.

Findings: It is argued that, throughout their careers, they are confronted with a dilemma that often leads to their being excluded and excluding themselves from the group of “those who may become partners”. It is shown that public accounting firms place both implicit and explicit obstacles in their way, tied to a desire to neutralise the effects, deemed costly, of motherhood. Moreover, the expectations of the organisation and society as a whole conflict on many points and confront female auditors with a dilemma: how to be a good mother and have a bright career? It appears that women who want to better manage this dilemma shape working practices imposed on the whole team and implement tactics to adapt their work‐life balance (specialisation and lateral move to staff departments). This leads to individual trajectories that break out of the organisational model and account for the scarcity of women in the upper management levels in audit firms.
Originality/value: The paper gives voice to male auditors and shows that managing the professional life/private life dilemma is difficult for fathers as well as mothers, in the long term. Moreover, rather than thinking in terms of horizontal and vertical segregations, this paper invites one to question the concept of the glass ceiling and consider the construction of the scarcity of women in the accounting profession.

This paper studies the process by which a change in the institutional logic of an organisational field diffuses through the management control system of a firm. The theoretical framework proposed by Hasselbladh and Kallinikos (2000. The project of rationalization: a critique and reappraisal of neo-institutionalism in organization studies. Organization Studies, 21, 697–720) enables us to describe the institutionalisation process of management control systems in more detail by observing how ideals are translated into discourses and control techniques. We argue that both the process by which institutional changes are implemented inside organisations and the process of decoupling are two aspects of the same issue. Revisiting core notions of new-institutional theory such as internalisation and decoupling, our findings question the systematic as well as the linear nature of the institutionalisation process. Empirical findings, based on a field study conducted in the French subsidiary of a pharmaceutical laboratory, highlight how the discourses of organisational actors contradict new ideals and control techniques. More particularly, it appears that, when a discourse cannot be heard, it can be partly bypassed using techniques. It is also argued that intra-organisational change builds on stable discourses and ambivalent technology, which foster insidious dissemination of the new institutional logics when “what can be done cannot be said”.

This paper investigates the practices whereby the subject, in an organisational context, carries out systematic practices of self-discipline and becomes a calculative self. In particular, we explore the techniques of conduct developed by management accountants in a French carmaker, which adheres to a neoliberal environment. We show how these management accountants become calculative selves by building the very measurement of their own performance. The organisation thereby emerges as the cauldron in which a Homo liberalis is forged. Homo liberalis is the individual capable of constructing for him/her the political self-discipline establishing his/her relationship with the social world on the basis of measurable performance. The management accountants studied in this article prefigure the Homo liberalis in the self-discipline they develop to act in compliance with the organisation’s goals.

Popular culture and the institutions and rituals that make it possible have become overwhelmingly significant in modern life. In this paper, we draw upon governmentality studies to explore the making-up (du Gay et al., 1996) of brand managers in a leading international cosmetics firm. Through in-depth interviews and participant observation, we analyse the control mechanisms through which brand managers embody their product and are made consumer subjects inside their own organisation. Illustrating how these key intermediaries of popular culture become “simultaneously promoters of commodities and commodities they promote” (Bauman, 2007), we not only account for the control practices in use in a key organisation related to popular culture, but also investigate how certain control practices shape the very site of popular culture.

Popular culture and the institutions and rituals that make it possible have become overwhelmingly significant in modern life. In this paper, we draw upon governmentality studies to explore the making-up (du Gay et al., 1996) of brand managers in a leading international cosmetics firm. Through in-depth interviews and participant observation, we analyse the control mechanisms through which brand managers embody their product and are made consumer subjects inside their own organisation. Illustrating how these key intermediaries of popular culture become " simultaneously promoters of commodities and commodities they promote " (Bauman, 2007), we not only account for the control practices in use in a key organisation related to popular culture, but also investigate how certain control practices shape the very site of popular culture.

This paper examines the organization of death. Through an ethnographic study, we examine how a geriatrics department guides the end of life. Drawing on Agamben, we show that organizations that are dedicated to life, but regularly confronted with death, develop dispositifs (mechanisms, technologies, practices and relationships) to turn biopolitics (power over life) into thanatopolitics (a regime of death). We also show how the inherently political meaning of life disrupts such government of death. The inclusion of political life in a regime of death disrupts organizational practices that find themselves facing fundamental questions of what makes a life worth living, who can decide not to prolong life, and based on which criteria.

Dans le courant dit critique, de nombreux travaux montrent que le contrôle des individus est obtenu en ayant recours à des effets de domination. Les travaux de Michel Foucault inspirent ce type de recherches en comptabilité et en contrôle, et la métaphore du Panoptique est devenue une référence lorsqu'il s'agit de s'interroger sur l'application de normes dans l'entreprise. Toutefois, si des organisations assimilables à un panoptique ont été identifiées, notamment par Hopper et Macintosh (1997), la plupart des recherches se limitent à comparer ces structures au panoptique, sans le questionner. Comment est instaurée et se maintient une structure panoptique ? Telle est la question à laquelle nous cherchons à apporter des réponses dans cet article. L'étude du cas d'Equipauto, un équipementier automobile, montre qu'il existe dans l'organisation, un lien entre un contrôle de type disciplinaire-associé au panoptique-et un contrôle exercé par les individus sur eux-mêmes. Chez Equipauto, le contrôleur de gestion est ainsi soumis à des épreuves de vérité face aux clients, aux ingénieurs, à sa hiérarchie, et doit montrer qu'il est celui qui produit et fait respecter la norme. En décidant ce au nom de quoi on exclut, il devient le producteurs d'un « savoir vrai » sur l'activité économique, acteur clé de la conception et du maintien du panoptique. Mais cette position implique également un travail permanent sur soi, ce que nomme Foucault « la subjectivation ». En s'intéressant à la conception et au maintien du panoptique plutôt qu'à sa mise en oeuvre, nous montrons ainsi qu'il est possible de dépasser la métaphore disciplinaire et de mettre en évidence l'engagement du sujet dans des jeux de vérité (Foucault, 1984b). De plus, nous choisissons une perspective très rarement adoptée, celle d'observer le panoptique du point de vue du gardien, i.e., le contrôleur de gestion. Mots clés Foucault, subjectivation, épreuve de vérité, contrôleur de gestion, étude de cas, automobile Discipliner et agir sur soi. La double vie du contrôleur de gestion

PurposeWomen in public accounting firms are still proportionally much fewer in number in the highest levels of the hierarchy than men, whereas recruitment at junior level tends to be increasingly gender‐balanced. This paper aims to analyse the relationships between the glass ceiling and motherhood. The mechanisms explaining the difficulties encountered by auditor mothers in their hierarchical progression within the Big Four in France are identified.Design/methodology/approachFrom 24 interviews with male and female auditors of various hierarchical levels, one seeks to reveal the specificity of the difficulties encountered by auditor mothers.FindingsIt is argued that, throughout their careers, they are confronted with a dilemma that often leads to their being excluded and excluding themselves from the group of “those who may become partners”. It is shown that public accounting firms place both implicit and explicit obstacles in their way, tied to a desire to neutralise the effects, de...