1 / 14

Asian Accounting Research: Leadership Challenges

Asian Accounting Research: Leadership Challenges. Shyam Sunder, Yale University Accounting Research Conference Indian School of Business, Hyderabad December 17-19, 2007. Leadership Challenges in Research. Innovation Policy Faculty Evaluation International and National Journals.

edda
Download Presentation

Asian Accounting Research: Leadership Challenges

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript


  1. Asian Accounting Research: Leadership Challenges Shyam Sunder, Yale University Accounting Research Conference Indian School of Business, Hyderabad December 17-19, 2007

  2. Leadership Challenges in Research • Innovation • Policy • Faculty Evaluation • International and National Journals

  3. Innovation • Imagination, creativity, and innovation is the essence of research • How many new ideas did we generate in accounting research journals last year? • For some reason, the number of new ideas in accounting research has fallen to a low level • Of course, method is important, and research has to be properly done to be of any value, but there is no substitute for innovation in accounting research • Academic leadership in research consists of innovation

  4. Policy • For more than three decades, policy research in accounting seems to have fallen out of favor • Returning to the parallel with medicine, abandoning policy research is like abandoning research on finding a treatment for diabetes in favor of only studying who gets diabetes and why • Of course the study of such questions is a prerequisite to finding a cure • But no learned profession can stop at the natural or social science level, without risking its scholarly status

  5. Faculty Evaluation • Teaching-Research-Service formula has considerable following in B-schools • Does this practice yield good teaching, research, and service in a desirable combination • What are the problems associated with current practice • What could be the alternatives? • Where do we go from here?

  6. An Example • Record of teaching success and productive scholarship supported by substantial publication • Evidence of recognition by peers. • Evaluation of teaching effectiveness before scholarship and professional service • Evaluation of record of publications, by outsiders if necessary • Materials prepared to aid classroom teaching • Administrative and other professional services to the University • External service (professional organizations and community, state, and federal agencies): judgment about the educational or scholarly value of the services rendered

  7. What We Want in Research • Creativity, innovation and thought leadership • Driven by curiosity about the world: How things work and why they don’t? • Contribution to society: how they might be made to work better • Explore new frontiers whose value and consequences may not be known for some (long?) time

  8. How Do We Promote Research? • Research scores weighted by journal ratings (objective?) • Citation counts • Download counts • Criticality of external letters of review (local vs. selection bias?) • Immediacy of assessment (power to editors and referees)

  9. What Do We Get in Research? • Maximization of publication counts • Journal ratings replace reading of research • Dominance of method over substance • Citation networks

  10. Holy Cows of Faculty Evaluation • Judgment vs. objective measurement • History of misuse of judgment • Individual merit vs. social justice • Time horizon of evaluation and decision • Shorter time horizon enables quick corrections of errors • Is more error prone

  11. International and National Journals • Publishing in international journals: blessing or curse of scholarship? • Many universities around the world encourage, even require, their faculty to publish their research in international journals • It helps maintain the “high standards” of research • It carries a stamp of unbiased distant authority behind controversial promotion and tenure decisions

  12. Cost of the Policy • Immense costs of “publish international” policy • Talent diverted away for addressing problems of society • Wastage of scarce financial resources • Under-development of organic research cultures • Critical thinking and discussion • Separation of scholarly critique and personal relationships • Local journals • Diversity of thought and methods • Editing and reviewing skills • End up with research for the sake of research, instead of research for the sake of innovation

  13. Summary • Accounting deserves and needs leadership in • Practice (developing social norms to balance reliance on written standards, professional self-discipline) • Education (what we teach, who is attracted to our classes, seed farms of knowledge, and place of accounting in the university) • Research (innovation, policy research, faculty evaluation, and developing local journals and research cultures) • I am privileged to have had this chance to discuss these challenges for accounting leadership that lie before us • How we tackle each of these challenges will determine the future of accounting

  14. Thank you www.som.yale.edu/faculty/sunder Shyam.Sunder@yale.edu

More Related