Do Apprenticeship Norms Encourage Supervisors' Audit Quality Enhancing Behaviors?

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Blum, Emily S.; Hatfield, Richard C.
• 署名单位: Texas A&M University System; Texas A&M University College Station; Mays Business School; University of Alabama System; University of Alabama Tuscaloosa
• 刊物名称: ACCOUNTING REVIEW
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0001-4826
• DOI: 10.2308/TAR-2023-0165
• 发表日期: 2025
• 页码: 33-51
• 关键词: client pressure; management; work; accountants; climate; BURNOUT; POWER

摘要

The audit environment operates using an apprenticeship model, where more experienced auditors are responsible for the training and development of junior auditors. Academic research has investigated this model primarily as a quality control mechanism for the subordinate's work product. In contrast, we investigate what effect the apprenticeship model has on supervising auditors. We theorize that coaching an apprentice activates norms that are accompanied by an ideal audit quality focus. In an experiment with experienced auditors, we find that salient apprenticeship norms result in a higher-quality sample selection. Although work-life conflict has an overall negative effect on quality, we find no evidence that apprenticeship norms attenuate this effect. Finally, auditors faced with client pressure improve the quality of their subsequent inventory testing selections only when apprenticeship norms are salient. Our findings expand our understanding of the ways the traditional audit environment encourages quality behavior, with important implications for research and practice.