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This study examines whether and how a client's business strategy can affect the relationship between auditor characteristics and financial reporting quality.

In this study, auditor industry specialization and tenure were used as proxies for auditor characteristics. The client business strategy was measured using the resource allocation index method. Finally, discretionary accruals are used to assess financial reporting quality. This study includes 1,450 firm-year observations and 145 companies listed on the Tehran Stock Exchange (TSE) over a ten-year period from 2011 to 2020. The research hypotheses were analyzed using a multivariate regression model and panel data.

The results show that auditor industry specialization increases financial reporting quality. This relationship improves when the client's business strategy deviates from the industry–normal strategy. The research findings state that auditor tenure has a positive association with financial reporting quality, and this relationship is strengthened when the company's business strategy deviates from the normal industry strategy.

The findings of this study provide important evidence for investors, firm management, and auditing firms. Investors must consider the auditor characteristics when selecting companies listed on the TSE. Managers of Iranian companies are advised to consider the auditor's characteristics when choosing an audit firm to increase financial reporting quality. Audit firms should evaluate their business strategies in audit planning to increase the quality of financial reporting.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first empirical study to examine the relationship between auditor characteristics and the financial reporting quality in the emerging capital market by considering the clients' business strategy.

This research study aims to establish the significance of collaborative governance practices in creating higher business value from an offshore IT outsourcing (ITO) relationship.

At the outset, a Delphi technique identifies the most significant ITO success criteria from a prescribed list, which is the outcome of a review and analysis of existing research articles. Subsequently, an empirical survey captures the perceptions of provider-side middle level professionals to prioritize these significant success criteria, which are the outcome of the Delphi study. Statistical analysis of the prioritized success criteria delivers a set of success factors, which forms the basic building blocks to formulate a set of offshore governance strategies. A real-life case evidence shows the practicability of implementing the proposed strategies underlining the similar practices taken up in the past.

A set of strategies and best practices for establishing collaborative governance mechanisms within a strategic offshore ITO.

This research study captures the perspectives of Indian service providers only.

This comprehensive study helps the contractual parties harness and augment the positive impacts of success factors in implementing superior contractual, relational and performance governance strategies within a strategic ITO initiative. A collaborative program management mechanism ensures the fruitful implementation of proposed strategies with the active support of top management of contractual parties. Consequently, the proposed strategies help offshore providers assess and augment their service capabilities for higher business efficiency and value creation.

Clients and IT outsourcing service providers are regularly confronted with changes in their business and IT environment. This paper aims at understanding the need for adaptability and the capabilities of service providers in outsourcing arrangements.

The paper uses a combination of literature research and case study research. A retrospective view on the case study was investigated using interviews, and analyses of reports and observations.

Clients are dependent on their service providers to adapt to changes and their service providers can help to better deal with their ever‐changing environment. This case study shows that the level of adaptability of service providers affects their sourcing capabilities, which results in improved customer retention by service providers and in their clients gaining competitive advantage. Service providers can create adaptability by developing their organizational capabilities, specifically by managing relationships and developing procedures for dealing with change.

As the aim was to improve the understanding, an explorative, single case study was performed. More detailed research of the various factors influencing the level of adaptability of services providers is recommended. Multiple case studies are recommended to gain a more in‐depth overview of a variety of causes and effects in different situations.

For outsourcing service providers this study suggests that they should create and continuously evaluate capabilities to remain competitive. In the case study the offshore service provider gained a larger share of the outsourced business. Furthermore, contracts are more likely to be extended. This research suggests that the service provider's ability to adapt should be part of the sourcing decision process of clients. During both the sourcing strategy and the tender selection phase, clients can identify to what extent an outsourcing partner will cater for environmental uncertainty.

The role of service providers in outsourcing arrangements has received only limited research attention so far. Furthermore, adaptability in sourcing arrangements has hardly been investigated at all.

The purpose of this paper is to propose an e-business assessment framework for organizations that aim to enhance the effectiveness of their online presence and maximize the benefits that result from it. The framework is based on three main pillars derived from the academic literature research: e-marketing strategies, customer relationship management (CRM) strategies and business model strategies.

This paper reviews the literature from e-Marketing, CRM and business model strategies, leading to the generation of an e-Business assessment framework. Second, it takes 19 case studies and analyzes them using ATLAS.ti, through qualitative content analysis, to validate that framework.

Pragmatic advice for practitioners derives from research results considering that this framework enables managers to characterize the company in terms of its e-business approach, making it possible to determine the level of depth of competitive online strategies. Lessons for an improved e-business approach can be derived from this paper.

This study proposes a novel e-business framework to assist organizations that want to have an online presence. This framework is comprised of the factors identified in the literature review that contribute to define and scope that online presence. The framework is then validated through the collection of 19 case studies of companies that have this online presence, validating the theoretical findings.

The purpose of this paper is to explore how facilities management (FM) suppliers can add value to their clients. It investigates client perceptions as well as the supplier perceptions, and searches for gaps between the two.

A literature search on client value sheds light onto key issues. The literature search is used to design semi‐structured interviews for four large clients' organisations and one major FM supplier, both at operational and strategic levels. A total of eight client managers and six supplier managers participated in 1.5 hours interviews.

There is a difference in perception between operational managers and senior managers, both at the clients' organisations and the FM supplier. There are areas which are more significant for clients than suppliers. These include the issues such as: trust and provision of timely management information and management reporting.

As with any case study the sample size is limited. The clients' organisations were all trading organisations, and may not represent the views of the blue chip clients.

Suppliers need to spend more effort on creating loyalty in existing clients, rather than generating new clients. Suppliers need to focus on finding solutions for client's business problems, rather than merely delivering a contract. Client satisfaction and assessment tools need to take a 360 degree perspective, rather than the usual survey of end‐users, or facilities managers.

The paper provides a case study of how client value is dynamic and dependant upon the role of the client in their own organisation. There is no single concept of value for any client. The detailed findings highlight specific areas where there are gaps between suppliers' and clients' perceptions.

Despite the popularity of decentralization, decentralized functions tend to lag in innovation, take longer to complete projects, deliver mediocre quality, sacrifice business synergies, and add little value to clients‘ strategic thinking. Here's why many firms are “recentralizing.”

Supported by the omnichannel strategy, the objective of this study is to identify the influence of integrated interaction quality and perceived fluency of service channels on attitudinal loyalty in the banking sector and to test the mediating effect of positive affect in these relationships.

This paper proposes a model that relates the constructs of integrated interaction quality, perceived fluency, positive affect, and attitudinal loyalty. A survey of 337 Brazilian bank clients was conducted and structural equation modeling was used for data analysis.

The results indicate that the construct of integrated interaction quality exerts positive influence on the loyalty of bank clients. The direct effect of the construct perceived fluency on loyalty is not significant. The results also demonstrate that positive affect exerts a mediating effect on the proposed relationships between the constructs.

This research assists banks in identifying relevant points regarding their service channels, so that they can determine how to generate positive experiences and customer loyalty through an omnichannel strategy. One can observe the behavior of banking consumers and develop business strategies based on the service channels, which aim to create a more profitable and loyal customer portfolio.

This study expands the literature regarding the omnichannel strategy by extending focus to include bank marketing, which is infrequently included in the body of such literature. This study also expands bank marketing research by including constructs that deal with consumer experience and loyalty.

This paper aims to explore the relationship between market share and performance of large accounting firms. It also investigates whether the performance of international accounting firms is better than that of non-international accounting firms.

This paper divides the empirical analysis into two stages. The first stage constructs a multiple regression model to explore the relationship between market share, international operations and the performance of large accounting firms. The second stage uses the Tobit regression model to identify the determinants of market share of international accounting firms.

Empirical results show that there is a significant, positive relationship between market share and performance, and that the performance of international accounting firms is better than that of non-international accounting firms. Second, from the perspective of business characteristics, the scope of the most international accounting firms is traditional auditing services; namely financial attestation and tax business services.

From the clients' viewpoint, market share is one of the key indices in determining the quality of the accounting firms' service.

As the market for auditing services in Taiwan is saturated, in the future, the accounting industry will be concerned with non-auditing services. It is suggested that the large accounting firms could follow the demand changes of their clients: employ professionals in various fields to provide specialized services, adjust the range of transnational and management consultant services, and operate management consultant services more aggressively. These measures would have advantages in a fiercely competitive market.

The purpose of this study is to explore the role of accountants as advisors in professional services firms (PSFs), and it examines the impact of digital transformation on the work, knowledge and skills of accountants in their role as advisors in PSFs.

Data were collected using semi-structured interviews predominantly with partners in Australian PSFs, including the Big4 and directors of professional accounting bodies.

The findings show that accountants as advisors fill a critical role in PSFs as they represent substantial human capital for such firms. Accountants as advisors are a valuable strategic resource because of their unique capabilities in combining generic human capital with digital human capital and social capital resources. Some differences between the Big4 and non-Big4 were found in terms of services offered that were attributable to the respective industry foci and resource availability.

The findings have broader implications for both the accounting profession and the education sector in terms of providing a better, and more overt, understanding of what the future holds for the accounting profession and the relevant knowledge and skills required. Also, recruiters and managers at PSFs are likely to benefit from the findings.

Evidence from PSFs provides insights into an evolutionary path for the accounting profession, and the knowledge and skills accountants need to work in that increasingly competitive domain, due to digital transformation.

Focuses on the perceptions held by organisational clients of the legal advice provided by their primary law firms. Previous work on service quality has been dominated by studies in consumer services and has been primarily outside the professional service context which is examined here. Empirical data collected from 152 corporate clients across a number of business sectors is used to examine a number of hypotheses relating client quality perceptions to key factors exhibited by both the legal service provider and the organisational client. The relationship between marketing and quality, and the marketing implications of the study for law firms are also discussed.