Managing Quality Control System Changes: How Audit Firm Leaders Experience and Navigate Conflicting Institutional Demands

• 成果类型: Article; Early Access
• 署名作者: Hayne, Christie; Peecher, Mark E.; Pickerd, Jeffrey; Zhou, Yuepin (Daniel)
• 署名单位: University of Illinois System; University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign; Brigham Young University
• 刊物名称: ACCOUNTING REVIEW
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0001-4826
• DOI: 10.2308/TAR-2023-0152
• 发表日期: 2025
• 关键词: ORGANIZATIONAL RESPONSES; accounting firms; LOGICS; field

摘要

Although rapidly evolving, quality control (QC) systems are a poorly understood determinant of audit quality. We interview 27 QC system leaders to understand how they navigate the challenges they face in changing QC systems. We find that many challenges-including obtaining buy-in, evaluating costs and benefits, and advancing proactive over reactive changes-are caused by conflicting demands arising internally. Consistent with institutional theory, our data reveal that leaders respond to conflicting demands by seeking partial conformity (e.g., negotiating among stakeholders) or by altering the framing of the demands (e.g., using scientific logic to legitimize a QC change). Interviews of eight QC system users complement and corroborate our main results and suggest opportunities for future research. Our study sheds light on how firms update QC systems and informs practitioners, regulators, and academics of the forces that shape the evolution of QC systems.